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maybedefinitely404 · 4 years ago

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Day 20: Moxiety

@tsshipmonth2020

(Yes this is out of order, but I figured I’d rather give you guys out of order content than no content at all. Hope that’s okay.)

Day 20 - You can send one item to your soulmate every year.

Content warning: Christmas, food mentions, homophobic family members mentions, serious fluffiness.

Word count: 2.7k

Songs mentioned in this fic: “I’m Dreaming of a White Christmas” and “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas”.

Patton’s eyes scanned over the letter, barely reading the words he’d read many times before. After the first time he’d gotten one, years ago, he’d re-read it so many times he’d committed it to memory.

Patton Hart,

You are receiving this notice to inform you that the annual soulmate item exchange is arriving. On December 24th, BEFORE MIDNIGHT, please bring your package to your nearest postal service or drop box, marked clearly with the provided adhesive label on the TOP. Item must be contained in the shipping box provided. Other boxes will not be accepted. If the drop off time is missed, your package will not be received.

There was no signature, no return address, no number to call. At first, he’d been slightly suspicious, since everyone he asked had no further information than what was on the small letter, but after the first year, when a beautiful black and gold notebook and a matching pen had shown up on his doorstep on Christmas morning, he’d decided to heck with his worries. Despite his initial curiosity, he’d sent a gift anyways (if it was legitimate, he wasn’t about to leave his partner without a present!), a grey beanie that he’d stitched a small heart and message into.

He giddily placed the letter back into the envelope and stuck it into the gap between the hallway mirror and the wall so he wouldn’t forget. Although, he doubted he would. He’d already bought a present, months ago, when his eyes fell upon a black and purple striped sweater in the window of the mall. The black thin stripes occasionally jumped, looking like the lines on a heart monitor, and it hooked him instantly. It was simplistic yet eye catching and unique, like the gifts Patton always received from his soulmate, so he immediately bought it and wrapped it as soon as he got home. He didn’t know his soulmate’s size, but you really can’t go wrong with an extra large (baggy sleeves are ideal, after all).

His time passed quickly, filled with movie nights with his roommate (who insisted on watching Nightmare before Christmas at least once a week) and trying new Christmas cookie recipes. It was his favorite holiday, with the songs and the decorations and the ever present smell of cinnamon in every store, so the moment they had passed Halloween, every moment was filled with his Christmas playlists and cheesy holiday sweaters. His family was coming to his place for their celebration this year, so the place was decked out with tinsel and little snowy villages, candles and fairy lights on every wall, and of course, their tree in the corner of the living room. It was going to be… amazing.

He’d offered to take his roommate’s soulmate item along with him to the post office, seeing as he was uneasy in high crowd situations, and soulmate exchange days were always insanely busy. It had been the right move, too, because as soon as the office came into view, he could already see the crowd of people milling outside, trying to get into the small door. What could you expect, though, only giving people a twenty four hour window to all show up to the same spot? By the time he got inside and got both packages passed to the handler on the other side (an arduous process, since they had to check each gift thoroughly to ensure there were no cards or any other way to identify the sender), it was dark outside. All he wanted to do was curl up with some hot chocolate and watch the Grinch, as the two of them had planned.

That’s what they did, falling asleep on the couch in the process. They were awoken in the morning by a knock at the door, Patton gently extracting himself from Virgil’s arms and turning off the TV, cringing that the cover screen of the movie had been on all night. The other mumbled in annoyance at his heat source disappearing and sat up, rubbing his eyes.

“It’s too early.”

“Merry Christmas, Virge!” Patton shrieked, ignoring his roommate’s mock irritated snarl as he gave him a tight hug. “Let’s go get our gifts!”

Begrudgingly, Virgil followed him to the door that he flung open, revealing two small parcels on the step. The labels from the senders had been replaced with simple name tags, another way to ensure that their soulmates would not be traceable. The other houses on the block all had similar ones outside their doors, and the carrier was nowhere to be seen, as usual. He picked them both up, handing Virgil his, and running back into the kitchen to get scissors, pretty much vibrating with glee.

“I’m making coffee first. You want some?”

Patton hummed, looking between the gift before him and Virgil’s tired eyes. “This can wait. Let’s have coffee.”

Virgil was barely able to conceal with excitement at being chosen over a Christmas present by someone who was essentially an overgrown child, pulling out two mugs. He passed his package to Patton, who placed it beside his on the table, and shuffled around his roommate to start on breakfast.

“It’s Christmas. You’re going to eat breakfast for once,” Patton interrupted the moment Virgil started complaining, grinning widely when he finally agreed.

“Do you ever wonder who your soulmate’s gonna be? What they’ll be like?” Virgil asked as he poured the coffee grounds, dangerously precise as always. The elder hummed.

“They’re your soulmate. So I guess, a perfect match to you. It’s not like they won’t like you or anything. That’s against the whole point!” An egg sizzled as it hit the pan, quickly followed by another.

“I guess,” He mumbled, clicking the on button on the machine. The smell of coffee quickly filled the small kitchen, “So when is your family getting here?”

“Around noon,” Patton chirped, flipping the first egg while simultaneously popping bread in the toaster with his other hand, “I like to cook, but my moms don’t trust me to make the main dish alone. My sisters are super excited to be old enough to help make food this year-- it’s so cute. But yeah, they should be here by noon.”

Virgil cracked a pained smile, watching the dripping coffee into the pot. “Okay. I’ll be out of your hair by then.”

Patton’s hand froze in mid air, whipping around to his roommate. “Excuse me?”

“I said I’ll be gone by then,” Virgil repeated, looking down to play with the hem of his sweater, “Do you want me to leave earlier? I can if you want.” His voice very nearly cracked as he spoke, tone getting quieter with each word. Patton’s heart shattered.

“Why do you think I want you to leave?” He whispered, blindly shutting the stove off behind him so the eggs wouldn’t burn. The toast popping startled them both, but neither could find it in them to laugh as they usually would have. Virgil shrugged.

“I mean, your family’s coming over. I’m not family. And I know you were super excited for them to come over, and I don’t want to… ruin the vibe,” He shook his fingers in weak jazz hands, shooting a watery grin at Patton. “I was just planning to go to the mall or something. I think it’s open-”

His words were silenced as Patton threw his arms around Virgil’s shoulders, pulling him into a tight hug. It was no secret that Virgil didn’t get along well with his own family. That was the understatement of the year, really. Patton didn’t know the details, refused to pry, all he knew is that it had something to do with Virgil coming out to a pretty conservative family, an action that ended with him being split off from everyone. He had lost his little brother to his parents cutting contact, among other things, and Patton realized with a start that this was Virgil’s first Christmas without his family.

In the single year they’d been roommates, the two had grown closer than any childhood friend Patton had kept throughout the years. Heck, he’d maybe consider them closer than he was with his moms, and that was saying a lot. For them to even fall asleep on the couch after a movie night, as they’d done last night, was a regular occurrence for them. They admitted secrets to each other they hadn’t fully admitted to themselves, about their own aromantic natures, about what that meant for soulmates, about what kind of pie was the best. Not all their conversations were deep.

“You are family, Virge,” Patton whispered, resting his chin on the other’s shoulder. “And unless you have a legitimate reason not to, you’re staying here. My family will love you, I swear,” He added quickly, knowing the other’s tendency to grow anxious around new people.

“Are you sure? I don’t want to ruin-”

“I will physically fight you,” He hissed before the other could finish, pulling out of the hug with a soft kiss to his temple. “Stay. For me?”

“Fine,” Virgil rolled his eyes, turning away in fake annoyance to pour their coffee, “For you.” He had a reputation to uphold after all, and him nearly crying was not great for it.

Just as they finished breakfast, Patton eyeing his present next to him with, again, startling resemblance to an excited child, there was a knock at the door. The roommates shared a confused glance, silently communicating that ‘no, I’m not expecting anyone’ before Patton got up to open it. He’d barely unlocked the latch when it burst open of its own accord, a loud shriek of “PATTY!” echoing through the small entryway.

“You guys are early!” Patton laughed as two small girls attempted to squeeze him to death around his torso, the pair having the same blond curls as Patton.

“These two just couldn’t wait to see you,” A woman Virgil assumed to be one of Patton’s mother’s smiled, angling above the girls to give Patton a gentle hug which he eagerly returned.

He quickly led them all inside, introducing a nearly shaking Virgil to his family. His other mom was carrying a box laden with uncooked food, and began to set it out in the small kitchen to begin preparing it. The girls, after a bit of hesitation, flocked to Virgil.

“Why’s your hair purple?” One asked, pulling herself onto Virgil’s lap. Her southern accent was just as strong as her moms’, reminding him of the accent Patton had slowly lost since moving in with him. It wasn’t gone all the way, just dimmed, but from the kitchen, he could hear his roommate talking to his moms animatedly, the accent back in all its glory.

“I drank too much grape soda,” Virgil lamented, “When I was little, I couldn’t get enough of it. And then it turned my hair purple.”

“No, it didn’t!” The girl leaning on his knee giggled.

“Are you saying I’m a liar?” He gasped, placing a hand over his heart, “How dare you!”

They both erupted into shrieking laughs, causing Patton to poke his head out of the kitchen. Virgil couldn’t help grinning widely at him as the second girl pulled herself onto his lap as well, causing Patton’s face to light up like the sun.

“Did you know Christmas is my favorite holiday?”

“Is it really? Why’s that?” Virgil asked, leaning back in his chair.

“It’s mine, too!”

“Nu uh, it’s only mine!”

“We can have the same favorite!”

“Nu uh!”

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Patton collapsed back onto the couch, groaning loudly. The tree was the only light in the darkened living room, the air still warm and smelling like the dinner they’d enjoyed hours ago. It was quiet again, his family gone back home. He’d missed them immensely, but he’d forgotten how loud they could be. His feet shifted on the floor, rustling the wrapping paper left over by his hurricane twin sisters; a mess he’d clean up tomorrow. Footsteps approached from down the hall, signalling his roommates arrival, and the speaker on the mantle started to quietly play “I’m Dreaming of a White Christmas”, Frank Sinatra’s soft voice drifting through the air.

“I’m so full,” He groaned again, resting his head on the back of the couch.

“Mood,” Virgil said, dropping next to him. He didn’t need to open his eyes to know that Virgil was just as tired as him. Tired, in the best way possible.

“You’re really good with kids,” Patton noted with a smile.

“Tell anyone and they’ll never find your body,” He deadpanned and Patton snorted, before he continued, “They’re the same age as my brother.”

“Oh,” He whispered, “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, surprisingly. I miss him. A lot. But this was the best Christmas I’ve probably ever had. No homophobic family members, no shouting matches, just… family. It was nice.”

“Hard to be homophobic when you have two moms,” Patton joked, relieved that Virgil snickered.

“Probably would be, yeah.”

I’m dreaming of a white Christmas,

With every Christmas card I write,

May your days be merry and bright,

And may all your Christmas’ be white.

They sat in comfortable silence for a bit, relishing in the silence of the house. The tree sparkled, lighting up the blank walls in rainbow hues, their conglomerate mix of thrift store ornaments shifting and reflecting the light. People shouted outside, joyful noises, and kids laughed, their neighbors wrapping up their own holiday celebration.

Patton opened his eyes as he felt something placed on his lap, looking down in confusion before grinning.

“Oh my gosh, I forgot!”

Virgil smiled sheepishly, shifting his own box between his hands. “I put them into my room when your family showed up.”

“Smart move. The twins would have torn them open.” Patton dropped off the couch onto the floor, sitting cross legged and shaking with anticipation. With a laugh, Virgil joined him when he gestured to the floor in front of him. He reached up and took his keys from the mantle, slicing open the duct tape on his box before handing it to Patton to do the same.

I’m dreaming of a white Christmas,

Like the ones I used to know,

Where the treetops glisten and children listen,

To hear sleigh bells in the snow

They opened their boxes in unison, Patton gasping when he saw the item in his. He pulled out the large, black fuzzy blanket, blue paw prints the size of Patton’s palm decorating the surface. A high pitched squeal burst from his lips as he squished the blanket to his chest, shoving his face in the soft fabric.

“Virgil, look! Isn’t it-”

His words caught in his throat at the expression on Virgil’s face; one of absolute shock. He was clutching his gift in white knuckles, and Patton’s mouth went dry when he caught the distinct black heart-beat-esque lines on the purple sweater.

“Oh,” Patton whispered, both of them frozen, looking at the gift they’d bought in the other’s arms. “Oh!”

“You’re my soulmate!” They both stated at the same time, breaking off into giggles.

“I guess so,” Virgil gasped, smiling as Patton pretty much leapt into his arms, trying to maneuver his hands around the other’s shoulders while still clutching the black blanket.

“Oh my gosh, I’m so relieved! You’re aro and I’m aro and it’s not going to be awkward with someone else, and I don’t have to explain and oh my gosh this is so fantastic!”

They both dissolved into another laughing fit, Virgil finally able to wind his arms around the other and pulling him closer. The end of the song slowly dwindled down as they both untangled themselves, unable to stop grinning. There was a moment of silence in the room as Virgil picked up a shrieking Patton and dropped him onto the couch, their sides sore from laughter, and essentially settled on top of him.

“Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” filled the room with soft violin swings as the two fell into a blissful sleep, wrapped in their respective gifts, more at peace than they’d been in… who knows how long.

#lywrites #tsshipmonth2020 #moxiety #patton sanders #virgil sanders #ts soulmate au #sanders sides #sanderssides #sanders sides fanfiction #sanderssidesfanfiction #sanderssidesau

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mycatshuman · 4 years ago

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Fright Night But Make It Gay

A Splendid Halloween Surprise

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!

Here we are, the final chapter. I want to thank you all for reading! Thank you for the support you have given me and I hope I ended this well.

First | Last | More

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Roman awoke to loud shrieking. He groaned. He would know that annoying noise anywhere. He reluctantly slid out of bed and made his way downstairs, his eyes still shut. "Remus, what is so important that you feel the need to wake me up from my beauty sleep?" He rubbed his eyes and opened them to find his brother and his boyfriend sitting at the island in the kitchen and staring back at him with wide eyes. He frowned. "What are you two doing?" He knew from experience that when those two got together, it wasn't good.

Last time they had gotten together, they had managed to prank the entire college campus into thinking that the moth man was actually real and was attacking their university. While it was funny, it was also nerve wracking because he knew his brother spilled all types of embarrassing childhood moments to his boyfriend.

"Nothing!" Virgil quickly said before looking back to Remus. He gave a quick nod before hopping off the counter and coming over to Roman, his arms opening to engulf his human in a hug. "Good morning, Princey."

Roman hummed happily and nuzzled into his boyfriend's embrace. "Morning."

Virgil smiled down at the other. "Come on, let's get you dressed, I have planned for a perfectly spooky day."

Roman smiled. One of the things he absolutely adored about his boyfriend was his deep love of Halloween. "Okay." Roman slowly pulled away from Virgil and moved to go get dressed when Virgil stopped him.

"I set out a package on your dresser. Wear that." He winked at him and Roman felt his knees go weak. It wasn't fair. The vampire before him wasn't allowed to be so pretty or it would end up killing him.

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Virgil watched as Roman walked up the stairs to get dressed. He turned back to Remus. "I'm gonna go yet changed real quick, help Roman with the makeup." And then he was gone.

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Roman had to admit he was a little confused when his brother came in after he put on the absolutely gorgeous prince costume his emo had gotten for him. Remus insisted that Virgil told him he had to do his makeup. While Roman was suspicious, he let his brother do his makeup. There wasn't much, just some reds and golds. Although, he was given purple lipstick which was a little weird but it made Roman feel giddy to be wearing Virgil's favorite color. He could only begin to imagine what his knight had planned for him.

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Roman grinned brightly once he saw Virgil. His love was wearing dark dress pants, a dark button up and a gorgeous purple vest. His make up was done with stunning purples dusting his eyelids. And on his lips a crimson red that dribbled down over his chin. Roman slid over to Virgil's side. "I have to say you look absolutely delectable tonight, my darling."

Roman flushed. "Not nearly as stunning as you, my dear."

Virgil laughed. "Although, I do believe something is missing."

Roman frowned. "What?" Virgil smiled shyly and leaned forward and placed a gentle kiss on Roman's neck. Roman shivered. "Oh, that." He grinned. "I'm such a bad influence on you."

Virgil smirked against his boyfriend's neck. "It's true. You are."

"Come on, I'm ready."

Virgil gently bit into Roman's neck before pulling his fangs out and allowing some of the blood to dribble down the others neck. Roman sighed. "I am so lucky to have met you."

Virgil smiled and pressed a kiss to his princes' lips. "And I you."

Roman clasped hands with the vampire. "So, what are we doing today?" He smiled happily as his loves' thumb ran over his hand softly.

"First, we're going to the movies to watch some scary movies. Then, we'll have lunch. After that, we'll go through a few haunted houses. Then, we'll go on a walk before we have a picnic dinner."

Roman hummed. "Well, it certainly sounds romantic."

Virgil nuzzled his nose with the princes'. "Only the best for you."

Roman snorted. "Tell that to yesterday you when I asked for cuddles and you threw a stuffed animal at me and said 'there's your cuddles, teddy bear.'"

Virgil snorted. "I was tired, you can't hold that against me."

"Okay, sure." He laughed.

"Let's go Princey, our adventure awaits."

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Virgil and Roman strolled through the park happily as the moon shone down on them with a brilliance. Their picnic basket rested snugly in the crook of Virgil's arm while his other arm was looped with his partners. His partner hummed happily.

It had been an absolutely lovely day with his wonderful vampire boyfriend. They had watched Hocus Pocus, The Nightmare Before Christmas, The Conjuring, and a few others. Then they stopped at a pizza parlor before going to a few haunted houses. Roman had a few frights but his boyfriend had held him throughout the houses and it made it all bearable. Then they picked up the picnic basket from Virgil's house before beginning their walk.

They had spaghetti and garlic bread for dinner. And Virgil even went out of his way so that they would do the Lady and the Tramp kiss. It was all so romantic and Roman was so absolutely infatuated with the vampire that he was sure he would burst with the amount of love he held in his heart for Virgil. Roman rested his head on his shoulders as they slowed enough for him to do so.

"Roman?" Virgil asked softly.

"Yes?"

"I-" the vampire stopped and turned to face his boyfriend. "I love you. A lot and…" he set this picnic basket down and slowly lowered himself until he was kneeling in front of Roman. "You're everything to me, Roman Belmonte. I'm ready to spend eternity with you, if you'll have me."

Roman watched as Virgil pulled out a box with a ring decorated with gold leaf inside. Roman grinned, his eyes filled with tears as he launched himself at his...fiance? Could they officially be called that? "YES! YES OF COURSE!"

Virgil laughed happily as he wrapped his arms around the human. Roman quickly leaned back out of the hug and allowed Virgil to place the ring on his finger. "Oh my god, this is the best moment of my life! We're getting married! We're engaged! Oh my god! Look at this ring! It says I'm getting married to the most handsome man in the world!"

Virgil shook his head. "No, I'm pretty sure that would be me getting married to the most handsome man in the world."

Roman's face split into a smile. "You proposed on Halloween. Oh that is so you. I love you so much!"

Virgil returned the smile before pulling Roman into a kiss. Yeah, he wouldn't trade this for anything.

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FNBMIG Taglist: @lehuka123 @baka-monarch

Everything Taglist: @misery-killed-me @superwholocked-for-life @mirror2thespirit @aroundofapplesauce @lyditist @little-euro-girl @unicornofdarknessstuff @odette-ssbu @ray-does-stuff

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snowe-zolynn-rogers · 4 years ago

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The BNHA Group Chat Fic Nobody Asked For

Pairings: Todoroki Touya (Dabi)/Mr Compress (Sako Atsuhiro), Shimura Tenko (Shigaraki Tomura)/Chisaki Kai (Overhaul)/Kurono Hari (Chrono), Yamada Hizashi (Present Mic)/Aizawa Shouta (Eraserhead)/Shirakumo Oboro (Loud Cloud), Fukukado Emi (Ms. Joke)/Kayama Nemuri (Midnight), Bakugo Katsuki/Kaminari Denki/Kirishima Eijiro, Iida Tenya/Monoma Neito/ Aoyama Yuuga

Word Count: 2,065 Words

Summary: Tetsutetsu's girl squad has a meeting, Halloween outfits, Sako and Touya are cute, and Kaminari comes out.

Warnings: Teen/Underage Pregnancy Mention, Period/Menstruation Mention, Food Mention, Blood Mention, Cursing, Death Mention, Half Blind Character, Deaf Characters, Mostly Mute Character (due to a different medical issue), Selectively Mute Character, let me know if I should add anything else.

Usernames: We Are Number One™ Aizawa: Dadzawa, Aoyama: immafiringmahlaser, Ashido: princessbubblegumknockoff, Asui: Galvan, Iida: Emergency Exit, Uraraka: 9.8, Ojiro: tailfloof, Kaminari: Pichu, Kirishima: baby shark, Koda: youredoingamazingsweetie, Sato: GuyFieriIsGod, Shoji: Cthulhu, Jirou: Jack Skellington, Sero: Spider-Man, Tokoyami: EdgarAllanCrows, Todoroki: WHERE?, Hagakure: cena, Bakugo: WHAT?, Midoriya: SmolMight, Mineta: Mineta, Shinsou: exhausted, Yaoyorozu: TheGreatCreator, Kurono: stopwatch, Chisaki: donthugmeimscared, Yukimura: choticgaydisaster, Bubaigawara: shadowclonejutsu, Shimura: idontfeelsogood, Awase: illrememberyouallintherapy, Kaibara: IDOWHATIWANT, Kamakiri: scyther, Kuroiro: itsmeyaboy, Kendo: Akimichi, Kodai: deadinside, Komori: shroomgurl, Shiozaki: wElCoMeToBiBlEsTuDiEs, Shishida: furry, Shoda: cryptid, Tsunotori: mylittlepony, Tsubaraba: airbender, Tetsutetsu: Iron Man, Tokage: t-rex costume, Fukidashi: glorifiedtextbubble, Honenuki: Eren Jaeger/spookyscaryskeletons, Bondo: Slimer, Monoma: HopeSummers, Yanagi: iLiEdImDyInGiNsIdE, Rin: snek, Toga: mystique, Sako: lostmymarbles, Hikiishi: queenofmagnetism, Iguchi: eye gucci, Shinokanri: stardust

Usernames: Emos Anonymous Kaminari: blackcloakedbrides, Shoji: fryingpan, Jirou: greentwentyfourhours, Tokoyami: myscientificinfatuation, Todoroki: twentyoneplotpoints, Bakugo: immobileinwhite, Midoriya: falldownboy, Shinsou: stabtheveil, Kurono: inhalecarolina, Chisaki: plummetingininverse, Yukimura: anxietyintheclub, Shimura: nappingwithsirens, Kuroiro: thousandfootcane, Kodai: marianaspit, Monoma: entiretimelow, Yanagi: recentyearsday, Sako: halfminutetomars, Aizawa: hollywoodlivingdead, Shouji: fryingpan, Kurono: inhalecarolina, Aoyama: phantomtown, Honenuki: visualizedragon, Sako: halfminutetomars, Awase: distressparade, Shinokanri: simplestrategy

Usernames: UA Teachers Are Tired™ Eraserhead/Aizawa: grumpy scarf cat, Present Mic/Yamada: screeching cockatiel, Midnight/Nemuri: chaotic goth gay Ingenium/Iida: gotta go fast, AllMight/Toshinori: actual sunshine, Vlad King/Kan: bloody hell, Power Loader/Majima: speechtotext, Ectoplasm: needalegup?, Snipe: kazoo cowboy, Cementoss: concrete block, Blackmist/Kurogiri: goth portals

Oh? Tea-Chapter 5

7:32 AM

We Are Number One™

WHERE?: [pic of Kumo, Ahma, and Sora playing tag with Kaede and Michi]

WHERE?: {pic of Hoshi, Tsuki, and Taiyo drawing with Asahi and Emica]

WHERE?: They're adorable today.

SmolMight: precious.

EdgarAllanCrows: I stan ten (10) good daughters of darkness.

SmolMight: Tokoyami and Dark Shadow helping with the girls is the cutest thing to see. I have been blessed upon witnessing this.

EdgarAllanCrows: They have claimed me as their weird bird uncle. I accept this. I shall cherish and spoil them.

chaoticgaydisaster: Thank god we have you to help, Tokoyami. I can't fucking move.

Emergency Exit: Why can you not move? Are you injured, Touya? Should someone help you to Recovery Girl?

chaoticgaydisaster: no, I'm just having my period and day two hurts more than day one.

lostmymarbles: I'll get your hot water bottle and ice cream.

Dadzawa: I got you excused from your hero training class today. Shoto, do you need to be excused today as well?

WHERE?: As much as I hate the assumption that me and my brother have the same cycle, we do and yes I do need today off hero training class.

mylittlepony: Why do they get off? Aren't periods normal?

SmolMight: they both have issues with their menstrual cycles where Shoto's is very heavy and Touya's is very painful.

mylittlepony: Oh, I get it, please excuse my ignorance of the situation.

chaoticgaydisaster: it's fine, Pony.

WHERE?: it's okay, you didn't know.

Iron Man: Do you two need anything?

HopeSummers: Tetsu, no, you can't abduct them into your little group.

WHERE?: I'm scared to ask, but what group?

Akimichi: Tetsutetsu is the leader of the UA Girls Protection Squad. He helps us all with our monthlies and just generally protects us from the grape gremlin in your class.

WHERE?: I agree to be abducted into this cult you have, Tetsutetsu.

chaoticgaydisaster: same here. let me join your cult.

Iron Man: These are now my children.

glorifiedtextbubble: great, he has more children

t-rex costume: meeting happens in one of you two's rooms tonight.

deadinside: We'll come at the meeting bearing food, tea, heat pads, and movies of you two's choice.

chaoticgaydisaster: I like disney movies.

WHERE?: pixar

SmolMight: oh god, this again.

SmolMight: just bring dreamworks movies. they can't fight over which is better then.

Iron Man: Thanks Midoriya.

SmolMight: you're very welcome. I just don't want to hear them have another pixar versus disney fight tonight.

Dadzawa: alright kids, time for class soon, make sure you're all ready except Yukimura and Todoroki.

4:07 PM

We Are Number One™

Iron Man: We come bearing zaru soba, oyakodon, curry bread, takoyaki, tonjiru, ice cream, and chamomile tea!

chaoticgaydisaster: so much food, jeez.

mystique: Tetsu insisted we make sure you two eat enough since you have bad periods and you might get anemic.

Iron Man: Plus, we also made sure they're all soft enough for you, Touya.

chaoticgaydisaster: hold on, gonna cry right quick.

WHERE?: don't cry too hard, it'll hurt.

chaoticgaydisaster: I know.

Iron Man: omw with the curry bread, tea, and cuddles! Girls, you better catch up, I'm running my way over to them.

chaoticgaydisaster: Thank you, Tetsu.

Iron Man: It's with my greatest honor.

6:24 PM

We Are Number One™

9.8: so what's everyone going as for Halloween?

cena: I'm going as the old school version of Mystique.

Spider-Man: only because I had to convince her to wear clothing and not do the movie version.

cena: you're no fun, Hanta! It's not like they'd see me!

tailfloof: anyway, moving on from the couple in aisle five, I'm going as Winter Soldier.

baby shark: me, Denki, and Katsuki are going as Mitsuki, Boruto, and Sarada

princessbubblegumknockoff: I'd kill to see Bakugo in a Sarada costume but we all know that's gonna be Kaminari.

princessbubblegumknockoff: also I'm goin as Eridan with Hatsume as Feferi.

TheGreatCreator: Me and Jirou are going as Sally from Nightmare before Christmas and Emily from the Corpse Bride. She insisted on scary and I cannot say no.

EdgarAllanCrows: This year, I'm going as a ghost bride. Last year I was a vampire, and the year before I was a witch. But this year, I am a ghost bride.

EdgarAllanCrows: And I have convinced my boyfriends to kind of match with me.

Cthulhu: What he means to say is he's going as a ghost bride, I'm going as a zombie, Koda will be a groom, and Sato is planning to be a skeleton.

Pichu: heh, four stages of life.

EdgarAllanCrows: He gets it. Our plan is working.

Galvan: I'm going as Harley and Ivy.

Emergency Exit: I'm going as the MCU Quicksilver.

immafirinmahlaser: I'm going to be the wonderful Viktor Nikivorov this year.

Dadzawa: I have been roped into group costumes this year

exhausted: what are they, dad, we're all so curious to know, I'm sure.

Dadzawa: you're going with us, don't act surprised.

Dadzawa: Mic and Midnight dragged me and Tensei into dressing up as the main cast of Heathers with Shinsou as a next generation Heather.

cena: which heather are you playing, Mr. Aizawa?

Dadzawa: Chandler with Mic as Macnamara, Midnight as Duke, and Tensei as Veronica.

cena: interesting. and Shinsou?

exhausted: well, ya see, I didn't want to go as JD so Mic came up with my character so it isn't the best character. I'm going as Heather Bay.

cena: and she is?

Dadzawa: Basically Chandler's kid that she gave up. Mic isn't very creative but we stan him anyway.

princessbubblegumknockoff: I think it's cute! you're still going as parent and child!

chaoticgaydisaster: me and Sho decided to go as Freed and Rufus from Fairy Tail.

Jack Skellington: so kinda twins but not really. crafty boys.

shadowclonejutsu: the rest of us ex-league are going as pokemon and Touya was supposed to be vulpix, but he wanted to be almost matchy with Shoto

chaoticgaydisaster: I know, I was supposed to wear a vulpix costume to match my husband being eevee but this is also my first halloween with my brother in well...forever.

princessbubblegumknockoff: Wait, so is this you two's first halloween?

WHERE?: yes. together at least. i've had one with my daughters and touya has had one with the League but we never had one together.

princessbubblegumknockoff: can I join the Fuck Endeavor squad @SmolMight?

SmolMight: I'm just the spokesperson of the Fuck Endeavor Squad. Touya and Shoto are the presidents. But yes, you can join.

princessbubblegumknockoff: good. yeet his stupid ass at the sun.

WHERE?: amen.

chaoticgaydisaster: preach girl.

8:34 PM

We Are Number One™

Pichu: babe, I need cuddles.

WHAT?: I'm on my way

Pichu: god, I love my husband

lostmymarbles: what a mood

chaoticgaydisaster: Atsu! don't make me blush! I have a reputation!

lostmymarbles: My husband is the best. God, I love him. He's amazing.

chaoticgaydisaster: Atsu, you're destroying my reputation!

lostmymarbles: sometimes I still hear him screeching when he blushes.

chaoticgaydisaster: I'm bout to be screeching at you, I'm blushing dammit

WHERE?: [pic of Touya blushing]

WHERE?: he's a tomato now.

chaoticgaydisaster: betrayed by my own brother. Monoma, may I join you on the roof?

HopeSummers: Sure, I guess but I don't want you to die so I'd have to shield you from the ground.

chaoticgaydisaster: worth it

lostmymarbles: babe no!

chaoticgaydisaster: Okay, I guess I won't.

HopeSummers: wow, that was easy.

chaoticgaydisaster: I am a simple man. my husband tells me not to jump off a building and I won't do it.

10:38 PM

We Are Number One™

Dadzawa: the name change paperwork is now done. now it's just the hearing and official birth certificate change.

Emergency Exit: That's great, Mr. Aizawa!

Dadzawa: we're having korokkes to celebrate. me and a few select Chosen Ones�� shall go get ingredients.

chaoticgaydisaster: sweet potato and chicken.

WHERE?: pumpkin and tuna

HopeSummers: Wow, you two have weird cravings.

idontfeelsogood: you should've seen Touya's cravings when he was pregnant.

shadowclonejutsu: It was even weirder combinations.

eye gucci: there was that instance with the pears and mushrooms

WHERE?: mine were bad too. but you can probably already tell that.

Dadzawa: anyway, anyone else want anything different than sweet potato and chicken or pumpkin and tuna

TheGreatCreator: shrimp please and pork for Jirou

shadowclonejutsu: I want shrimp too

SmolMight: I just like cheese in mine, Tokoyami says he likes salmon, Sako says he likes egg.

baby shark: Baku likes ham and cheese, Kami likes mushrooms, and I like shrimp too.

cena: Me and ojiro both like eggplant and Tsu and Mina both like peppers, onions, and cheese

idontfeelsogood: count me in for pepper, onions, and cheese

donthugmeimscared: me too

stopwatch: same here

GuyFieriIsGod: ya know what? I want octopus in mine.

Cthulhu: I second the octopus.

9.8: I like tomato and cheese.

immafirinmahlaser: moi likes ham and cheese as well, reminds me of home.

Spider-Man: spinach and tofu.

GuyFieriIsGod: Koda says kimchi and cheese for him.

Emergency Exit: ...kimchi and cheese as well

princessbubblegumknockoff: oh my god, Iida likes weird food combos too!? revolutionary.

SmolMight: we stan one (1) good fast boy

Dadzawa: and my son likes kimchi and cheese in his too. Ashido, Hagakure, and Yaoyorozu, you three are Chosen™.

Dadzawa: choose who you may to go with you.

cena: I'm bringing Tsu and Ochako.

princessbubblegumknockoff: I'm dragging Mei with me.

TheGreatCreator: I'll bring Jirou

cena: girls only outing with Mr. Aizawa!

Pichu: does that mean I go too?

GuyFieriIsGod: Kami, you're a girl?

Pichu: I'm kinda working on that.

baby shark: you sure you wanna tell everyone?

Pichu: yeah, it's not like they won't find out.

Pichu: I'm in the process of transitioning mtf. I'm just trying to get up enough money to get bottom surgery. then it's just my HRT.

WHERE?: is there a way I can convince you to let me pay for it?

Pichu: I...wait, did you just offer to pay for my bottom surgery?

WHERE?: yes.

Pichu: Todoroki, I can't accept that! I have to earn this myself.

WHERE?: okay

Dadzawa: anyway, girls, come on. (yes, you too Kaminari)

Spider-Man: Hey, Kami, is there a name you've picked out yet?

Pichu: yeah, I was thinking Akari or Uzume. I'm leaning more toward Uzume.

princessbubblegumknockoff: I love our good pichu girl Uzume Kaminari.

Dadzawa: I'll begin the paperwork for getting you switched to the girls dorms if you'd like after we eat.

Pichu: Thank you, Mr. Aizawa!

Dadzawa: I have a clinging pokemon daughter and I couldn't be happier.

princessbubblegumknockoff: [pic of Kaminari hugging Aizawa tightly in the van]

Izukrew

11:04 PM

We Are Number One™

WHERE?: I have an idea for Kaminari.

SmolMight: I'm all ears.

WHERE?: before that happens.

WHERE? has added WHAT? to Izukrew

WHERE?: where does Kaminari work, Bakugo?

WHAT?: Heiwa to Chowa in Kamino. Evening shift from 5 to 10 every day. I have a feeling I know what you and your brother are planning, Fireball.

WHAT?: And I greatly approve of what you're planning. Uzume is a stubborn woman, she won't accept help if she's put her mind to doing it herself. She's only got the last 300 dollars from the cost of the surgery to cover.

WHERE?: Good, thank you. I shall plan accordingly. Touya starts the same shift tomorrow so I have an excuse to be there if questioned.

WHAT?: I'm leaving now. I'll be there to watch at her shift start tomorrow. You better be nice to her.

WHERE?: I may be gay but I know how to treat women, I drink my respecting women juice every morning.

WHAT?: Good, drink your respecting women juice or else I'll explode your face.

WHAT?: With that lovely sentiment.

WHAT? has left Izukrew

9.8: I feel like I just watched a back-alley deal and I love it.

SmolMight: You get used to it. That's just how Kacchan and Shocchan interact with each other now that they're friends.

9.8: Kamino made you two scary close.

WHERE?: we're also pretty close with Shinsou and Bakugo had a real bonding moment with Touya.

WHERE?: you bond pretty well with a person when you're trapped together and happen to have your periods at the same time while kidnapped.

9.8: you got me there.

Emergency Exit: Todoroki, are you going to take money out of your father's card to pay for Kaminari's surgery?

WHERE?: you're getting it Iida. you are correct, that's exactly what I'm doing.

Emergency Exit: Then I shall go with you to make sure you don't do anything stupid.

Taglist: @logan-sanders-enthusiast @luckyicekitsune @whippedbel @lgbtforeverything @pinecone-chomper @mikmacmoo @wasinotwantedatthisexactsecond @purplespiderstormcloud @stankyratman @king-of-the-oranges @headcannons-and-random-things @fear-ze-queer @turtleluv799 @ymmm-someone

#boku no hero academia #my hero academia #bnha #mha #snoweywrites #the bnha group chat fic nobody asked for #league of misfit heroes au #tw pregnancy mention #tw period mention #tw menstruation mention #tw food mention #tw blood mention #tw cursing #tw death mention

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golbrocklovely · 6 years ago

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only the lonely survive // colby brock - chapter six: don’t forget to take a breath

A/N: haven’t updated in a couple days, sorry about that. while i was away, I actually started writing a new fanfiction ;) nothing like this one. a little more thrillery and spooky. i’ll post more about it later. nonetheless, please enjoy this chapter and lmk what you think. if you want to join the taglist, hmu :) <3

description of the story

taglist: @ajosieface , @localsleeper , @julyrubyrose

trigger warning: swearing, talks of rejection

word count: 1729

DAY 3/14

"Do you actually like Beetlejuice?" Colby asked, stuffing a bunch of fries into his mouth.

"Yes! It is one of my favorite movies. Hands down the best Tim Burton movie to me." I replied, taking a bite out of my McChicken sandwich.

"What about Corpse Bride, or Nightmare Before Christmas?" He questioned.

I shrugged, "Irrelevant."

He rolled his eyes jokingly and took a sip from his drink.

Colby and I sat in the parking lot of McDonalds eating our food in Colby's car, barely lit up by the sign of the golden M and the tiny overhead light. I sat crisscrossed, facing Colby. He had his body turned towards me.

"You know, I could have paid for my meal." I insisted, looking up at him.

He swatted his hand towards me, "It's no big deal. Your meal was like under five bucks."

"Well, thanks again. But I'm paying next time." I stated.

"There's gonna be a next time?" He smirked.

I sighed, "Why do you insist on teasing me?"

"Because you look cute annoyed." He said, biting his burger.

I blushed lightly. I'm happy the car is too dark for him to see.

"Anyway," I continued. "What's your favorite movie?"

"I like Scott Pilgrim Versus the World." He nodded.

I nodded back, "Good choice."

He dipped his fries into ketchup, "What's your favorite song at the moment? Or is it the one that you sang today?"

I thought for a moment. "I do love that song, but it's not my favorite right now. I think my favorite at the moment is an old song... Stars by Switchfoot."

"Never heard of it." He replied, wiping his hands on a napkin.

I gasped, "My dude, it is so good. Seriously, I think you would like it."

He giggled, smiling lightly. "Okay, I'll have to listen to it. Do you have a favorite band?"

"I do. You won't believe what band it is." I smirked, taking another bite of my sandwich.

"Um... yeah, I have no idea. Is it a weird band?" He asked, twisting his face.

"It is. You may or may not have heard of them. I mean, you do have a cardboard cut out of one of their members." I hinted, only glancing at Colby for a moment.

He raised his eyebrows, surprised, "Your favorite band is the Jonas Brothers?"

I nodded enthusiastically. "You have no idea how much I love them!"

"Is your favorite song by them Burning Up?" He teased, grabbing the last of his fries and shoveling them into his mouth.

I sighed, immediately annoyed. "Fuck no. That song is good, don't get me wrong, but only locals like that song."

"Locals?" He questioned.

"I don't know, it's what twitter stans use to basically call someone a fake fan. Nonetheless, my favorite song from them is called Take A Breath." I said, putting my trash into the leftover McDonalds bag.

"Play it for me." He replied, handing me his phone that was connected to the aux chord.

"Really? You want to listen to the Jonas Brothers with me?" I asked, almost whispering.

"Sure. Play the other songs you mentioned too. I want to get to know your music taste." He informed, starting the car and putting his seatbelt on.

I repeated his actions, and then opened Spotify on his phone, I made a small playlist of a couple songs I had mentioned to him. The first one being Take A Breath.

The whole ride to his house, I tried not to be too loud of a singer - just kind of mumbling through each song. It was late and I didn't really feel like belting out at 1:47 in the morning.

After a couple songs played, we arrived at his house. Pulling up to the gate, he clicked a button on his key ring, and the gate opened. He drove forward, parking the car and turning it off.

The Trap House looked a bit eerie, all the lights being off except for the light outside. We got out of his car and walked to the front door. He unlocked and opened it for me. I walked in to only the hallway light on.

"Everyone's asleep so we have to be a bit quiet." He stated quietly, while we walked up the stairs.

We went to his room, the door already opened. A redish glow light illuminated the room. I looked around his room. It was so weird to see it in person. It was a bit messy, but not too bad. A pile of clothes laid on his couch. A few post-it notes on the floor, most likely fallen from the walls covered in them.

"Ignore the clothes on the couch. They're clean, I just haven't put them away yet." He admitted, taking his shoes off and shutting the door lightly.

I sat down next to the clothes pile on the couch. He walked over to his desk and emptied his pockets. He then sat down on his bed. It was quiet for a moment.

Oh my God Skye, say something!

"So... what do you want to talk about?" I asked, look over at Colby.

"I-uh don't really know, to be honest." He replied, shrugging his shoulders lightly.

"We could always play twenty-one questions, just to get to know each other better." I stated.

He smiled. "Do people actually play that game or is that just in the movies?"

"Is that your first question?" I sassed.

He snickered. "Of course not."

"Well ask me something. Anything you like to know. I'm an open book." I said, stretching out my body and throwing my hands behind my head.

Colby shrugged. "Okay then, um... what is your favorite animal?"

"Ooh Corgis! Or like a baby hippo. I just connect with those animals on a spiritual level." I laughed.

He chuckled, "Why?"

"Because I'm stubby like a corgi and big like a baby hippo." I smiled.

Colby nodded his head, "Corgis are really stubby."

"It's honestly a shame for them. Should I ask you a question now?" I cocked my head to the side.

"Yeah, go ahead." He replied.

"Uh... chocolate or vanilla?" I asked.

He stretched out a bit, getting comfortable, "Chocolate. 100%. Favorite holiday?"

"Halloween. Favorite color?"

"Blue. Beach or woods?"

I sighed, pursing my lips, "I like both, if I'm honest. I would choose a forest, but bugs are a thing and I despise bugs, so I guess a beach."

"I'm more of a beach person." He stated.

"I've haven't been to the beach since I was like five." I admitted.

He sat up, "What? How? You live on the east coast."

"So? I live a couple hours away from the shore. It's not worth travelling through New Jersey to get to a beach that's always crowded." I complained.

"I guess so. But you must go to the beach while you're out here though." He insisted, grabbing a water bottle off his desk and taking a sip.

"I'll try. I can't make any promises." I answered.

"I haven't been to the beach in a while. Maybe a bunch of us can go together." He shrugged, smiling.

I smiled back, "That sounds fun."

We kept talking, learning all the little things about each other. It felt like we had asked all the basic questions. I wanted to take the next step, ask something deeper than favorite color and fast food places.

"Ask me a crazy question. Like, seriously anything. Something you probably wouldn't ask a stranger, but I'm giving you free range to do so." I insisted, standing up and going over to a section of post it notes on his wall. Some had random messages and little doodles, some were blank.

"Okay then. What's your biggest regret in life?" He turned his body towards me, his one leg dangling off the bed.

I hummed. "I don't have too many regrets. Maybe just one though."

"What is it then?"

I turned around to him. "There was this boy in high school. I met him my freshman year, became friends with him, and loved him until the day we graduated. I never told him how I felt."

"Why?" He whispered.

I chuckled sadly. "Because rejection is a bitch and I was too scared to admit it to him. Plus, he always had a girlfriend or if he didn't have one, he was chasing after my best friend at the time."

Colby scoffed. "Wow, he seems like a catch."

"Well, he didn't exactly know I loved him. I kept my feelings pretty hidden." I slowly moved towards the bed.

"Do you wish you guys dated?" He replied.

"Yes and no." I sat down, crossing my legs, "I wanted to be with him so badly, but I realized our senior year that we were never meant to be. Like, it was a real gut feeling that came to me randomly. Like, even if I would have admitted my feelings for him, it wouldn't have changed our relationship, I don't think. We just weren't meant to be together at that time."

His eyes met mine. "Do you still have feelings for him?"

I shook my head, "No. I haven't thought about him in years honestly. I don't really regret what I did and didn't do with him. I'm just more curious as to what our outcome would have been if I would have said something."

Colby looked at me and nodded his head lightly.

"Can I ask you something and you have to be honest with me?" I mumbled.

He squinted his eyes at me, smiling, "Yes?"

"Tell me about your first serious girlfriend. You don't have to say her name, or how old you were, just tell me about her." I stated.

He sighed, lightly playing with the rings on his fingers. "I don't know..."

Shit Skye, you fucked it up.

"If you don't feel comfortable, you don't have to tell me. I'm sorr-" I started.

He cut me off, "No, don't apologize." He paused for a moment, "I'll tell you. But I have to ask you something beforehand."

"Okay." I uttered.

He grabbed a pillow and pulled it into his lap, hugging it slightly. "Do you think it's weird... that I've only ever had one serious girlfriend? Be honest."

I glanced up, looking into his eyes, "Of course not. I've only ever had one boyfriend."

He nodded. "Okay then."

<< CHAPTER 5 || CHAPTER 7 >>

#colby brock #colby brock x oc #colby brock fanfic #colby brock fanfiction #colby brock fluff #colby brock story #colby brock fic #only the lonely survive

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ionlyreadfivebookslastweek · 6 years ago

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Bless the Broken Road - 14

After the briefing, Jane and Spencer headed to the jet. On the way there, he asked her what Garcia needed help with.

“She was interrogating me about our relationship. Heads up, she plans on doing the same to you,” she told him.

Spencer chuckled. “Alright.”

When they had gotten settled on the plane, Jane’s phone went off.

“Hey Jack,” she greeted her little brother.

“Hey Jane, how are you doing?” he replied.

“I’m good. We just got on the jet to head to a new case. How are you?”

“I’m great. I wanted to tell you that I might be getting a promotion at work!”

“Jack, that’s awesome!”

“I might be. It’s not for sure yet.”

“Well still, it’s an honor to be considered,” she reminded him.

"If I get it, I’ll also get a raise. I’m thinking that with the extra money I can look into buying a house! I don’t need that much space or anything, but I would like to own a place instead of renting, you know?”

“That’s great!”

“So when do you want to visit again?” Jack asked, changing the subject. “What about this coming weekend?”

“This weekend’s no good. It’s Halloween and Spence is extremely obsessed with the holiday,” she explained, looking at Spencer sitting next to her.

"Even more than you are with Harry Potter?”

“If I were obsessed, but I’m not so actually he’s super obsessed and I’m sure he’ll want to celebrate all weekend.”

Spencer nudged her arm, causing her to shout.

“What was that?” Jack asked.

“Oh, nothing, Spencer just nudged me. Anyway, maybe the following weekend? I’ll let you know.”

“Alright. I have to go back to work. My break is almost over.”

“OK, I love you. Bye.”

Jane put her phone in her bag before sharing the potential good news.

“Jack says he might be up for a promotion and if he gets it, he’s buying a house!” she said.

“That’s great!” Spencer cheered.

“You’ll have to let me know if he does look into buying a house. I can help Jack pick out a nice one. I renovate properties and I’ll have a good idea what to look for,” Morgan spoke from his seat across from her.

~~~

By Friday, the team was back working in the office. Jane was at her desk filling out some paperwork when Spencer snuck up behind her, wearing a mask.

“Raaaaaaawr!” he yelled, causing her to scream.

“Spencer! Why’d you scare me like that?!”

"Cause it's almost Halloween!” he cheered, laughing as he took off the mask. “There are tons of options for celebrating this weekend. The drive-in is doing movies tonight and tomorrow night, there’s a bunch of haunted houses, Fall Festival has loads of fall treats and activities and at night they do a reenactment of the 19th-century phantasmagoria.”

“Phantasmagoria?” she questioned.

"Phantasmagorias are these amazing pre-cinema projected ghost shows invented in France, where the showman attempted to spook the audience using science magic."

Jane laughed at his excitement. “Well, I’m up for anything. What do you think we should do?”

He paused a moment in thought. “What if we do haunted houses tonight and then the fall festival and phantasmagoria tomorrow on actual Halloween?”

"Alright,” she agreed.

“Really?”

“Yeah...” Jane trailed off, confused by his confusion.

“it's just that no one ever is interested in going to the phantasmagoria with me,” he admitted.

“Well it sounds interesting, and if you want to see it then I'm fine with that.”

Spencer knelt down and hugged her in appreciation. “Thank you for putting up with my nerdy fascinations!” he told her. She laughed. “We should both hurry and get our work done so we can leave early.”

Jane agreed. “Sounds like a great idea, but I need to use the bathroom first.”

Spencer nodded and returned to his own desk while she made her way to the bathroom.

While in the bathroom, Jane ran into Penelope, who was all decked out in orange and black.

“Oh, I see someone else is in a Halloweeny mood as well!” Jane commented.

“Yes, well, no one can be as obsessed as Reid.”

“You’re not wrong,” Jane laughed. “Tonight we’re going to haunted houses and tomorrow he’s taking me to the Fall Festival to see the phantasmagoria.”

“Aww. You two are so nerdy and cute!”

“Well, if it makes him happy, then I’m happy,” Jane replied.

That night, Jane and Spencer headed out to go through some haunted houses.

“Spence?” Jane spoke as she stopped walking towards the house.

“Yeah?” Spencer stopped a few feet ahead and looked back at her.

“I’m not so sure about this. I didn’t handle the horror movie we watched that one time all that well,” she confessed.

“Jane,” he walked back to her and took her hands. “We handle the real monsters every day. Just remember that none of it is real. Okay?”

Jane sighed and looked up at him. “OK. Let’s go.”

Spencer smiled and kissed her forehead before leading her up to the house.

After going through the haunted house, Spencer took her to another one. Once they had gone through that one too, Spencer said, “Just one more!”

“Fine,” Jane agreed. “But only because I love how happy you are.”

They headed to the final house and got in line. When it was their turn to go through, she clung onto him as best she could.

A spider dropped down from the ceiling and Jane screamed. Spencer shouted in surprise but then laughed, enjoying her fear.

As the pair continued through the house, the pathway narrowed and they were forced to go single-file.

Jane opted to go first, holding Spencer’s hand behind her.

A series of scares jumped out at them in rapid succession. During the chaos, Spencer’s hand slipped out of hers. She turned around to see that he had disappeared.

“Spencer? Spencer!” she called out, looking around.

Another man jumped out and she screamed again.

Jane was forced to continue down the pathway until she finally made it outside. She spun around, trying to locate Spencer. Unable to find him, she began hyperventilating and fell to her knees, terrified.

“Jane!” Spencer called, seeing her on the ground once he made it out of the exit. He ran over and knelt down beside her, throwing his arms around her.

“I couldn’t find you!” she cried.

“I know. I’m here now. I’m sorry, we can head home now, alright?”

“Alright.”

He helped her to her feet and led her back to the car.

On the way back to her apartment, Spencer apologized again. “We should’ve been done after the 2nd house.”

“It’s not your fault,” Jane assured him. “You said we could be done whenever I wanted but I saw how happy it made you and I didn’t want to disappoint you. I chose your happiness over my own fears.”

Spencer pulled into a parking spot at the apartment complex. Once the car was in park, he reached over and hugged her and kissed her.

“I love you. You know that, right?” Spencer told her.

“I love you too,” she repeated back.

Jane grabbed her purse and exited the vehicle, bidding him goodnight.

The next day was officially Halloween. Jane and Spencer spent the day at Fall Festival. When the sun went down, they headed over to the place where they would put on the phantasmagoria.

Spencer’s face lit up at the sight, but Jane’s focus was on watching him, enjoying how excited and happy he was. Jane snuck a picture of him and sent it to Garcia, telling her how adorable he was.

On the way back to the car, Spencer grinned at her and leaned down, kissing her cheek.

“What was that for?” Jane asked.

“I’m just so grateful for you putting up with me this weekend,” Spencer laughed. “I know I can go a little hardcore this time of year.”

“Well, I like Halloween as well. And I love seeing how happy it makes you,” Jane told him.

They headed to Reid’s apartment and changed into pajamas before settling in on the couch to watch Halloween movies, which Jane picked out. First, they watched Hocus Pocus and then The Nightmare Before Christmas.

”We already watched that one though,” Spencer argued when she put in Nightmare.

”But it’s sooooo good!” Jane insisted.

Towards the end of the movie, Jane felt her eyelids grow heavy. She gave in to the temptation and fell asleep on the couch.

Jane opened her eyes to find herself lying in bed next to Spencer. He was already awake, staring back at her.

“Good morning,” he spoke softly.

“Morning,” she mumbled back. “Didn’t I fall asleep on the couch?”

“Yeah, you did.” He moved to sit up on his elbow. “I carried you to the bed. I figured it’d be more comfortable,” he explained.

“That’s so sweet.” Jane reached up and ran a hand through his hair before caressing his cheek. “I love you,” she told him.

Spencer smiled and leaned down to kiss her, telling her between kisses, “I love you, too.” He rolled to be on top of her and began trailing kisses down her neck.

Before things could go any further, both of their phones began to go off with texts from Garcia.

Spencer rolled back off of her with a groan, causing her to giggle.

He reached for both of their phones, handing Jane hers, and read the text message.

I hope you all enjoyed your Halloween cause now it’s November and we have a case. ~Garcia

“I guess we have to go,” Jane stated, moving to get ready.

When the team was all gathered in the briefing room, Garcia flashed images up on the screen and began to share information on the case.

“Three people have been found dead at a haunted house. All of them had different TODs: 10, 10:30, and midnight. The only one who someone noticed was missing was the 3rd victim, Maisy Gibson.”

“Who reported her missing?” Hotch asked.

“See sir, technically, she wasn’t officially reported missing. Her friend says she got separated in the haunted house and she couldn’t find her so she alerted the staff supervisor. It was around closing time so they were able to go search for her. That’s when they found her body along with the two male victims. All of them were stabbed to death and all had this painted on their face.”

Garcia pointed her clicker at the screen and pictures of the bodies popped up, the sign of satan on each of their faces in red paint.

Morgan looked over at Reid and Addison and noticed the look they exchanged.

“What is it?” he asked.

“Jane and I went to that haunted house last night,” Spencer shared with the group.

“Two-thirds of the way through, they make you separate and you’re on your own until the end,” Jane informed them.“It’s possible that the UNSUB was in the house along the divided path.”

“He could grab people when no one else is around and when people do come while he’s killing, people think it’s all an act and don’t realize they’re witnessing an actual murder,” JJ contributed.

“Was there anyone there with the first two victims?” Rossi asked.

“They were actually there with each other, judging by their posts on social media,” Garcia told them.

“They must have been put into separate groups when they went through,” Spencer thought aloud.

“Addison and Reid, I want you to head to the crime scene,” Hotch ordered. “Morgan, Rossi, and I will talk to the friend and families of the victims. JJ, I want you to cover the press. We don’t want the signs of devil worship to get out. Garcia, find a way to figure out any witnesses that we could possibly talk to. See who posted about being at the house.”

The team mobilized immediately.

Around fifteen minutes later, Jane and Reid met the owner of the haunted house at the entrance area. From there, he led the pair back to the crime scene.

“Do you know which of your actors were assigned to this area?” Jane asked the man.

“I give them the freedom to improvise, but no one was specifically assigned to this area,” he explained.

Jane nodded in understanding.

“We’re going to need a list of all employees sent to our technical analyst.”

“I can get that for you.”

Jane pulled out a card. “Please send the file to this address.”

“Got it.” He took the card. “I’ll get that sent off right away. If you need anything, I’ll be up front.”

Spencer thanked him before turning to help Jane examine the crime scene.

“So how’d this play out?” he asked.

“So the victim is going through the house. They get distracted by something jumping out or a noise or something.” She turned around and bent over, slipping a glove on before picking up a chain connected to the wall. “The UNSUB grabs them from behind and chains them to the wall.”

“He then stabs them and paints the sign on their face,” Reid continued.

“The UNSUB had to know the victims would be alone. The first two were friends but no one else was with them so nobody would know that they didn’t come out. But how’d he do it? He couldn’t be in two places at once,” Jane questioned.

“The first two victims went through with strangers who didn’t care to notice they never exited the house with them.”

Jane thought for a moment. “He must have seen Maisy alone in line while her friend was in the bathroom or something. He assumed she was alone when she wasn’t.”

“The mistake that got him caught,” Spencer confirmed.

Jane took a deep breath and looked around, trying to avoid looking at Spencer.

“Something’s bothering you. What is it?” he asked bluntly.

Jane wheeled around to look at him. Her eyes widened in surprise at how fast he picked up on her emotions. She opened and closed her mouth several times before finally speaking. “It could’ve been one of us, Spencer.”

He shook his head. “The UNSUB was there last night, not the night we went,” he argued.

“Well, you don’t know that. He could’ve been! He clearly knew what he was doing. It’s likely he’s done it before. What if he killed you or me?”

Spencer stepped forward and embraced her, giving the top of her head a kiss. “He didn’t though. Don’t focus on what could’ve happened,” he told her.

“Yeah, you’re right,” she agreed, stepping out of his arms. “Let’s head back to headquarters. I’ll call Garcia and let her know the list is coming her way.”

They headed back out to the front and thanked the owner before driving back. On the way there, Jane called Garcia about the list of employees. “Also check missing person reports for people who went missing around the hours of operation for the haunted house. If any of the reports say they last saw them before they left to go to the house, it could be more victims,” she informed her.

The team gathered back in the briefing room to discuss new information they’d found.

A few minutes into discussions, Garcia entered the room.

“I talked to potential witnesses who described the man as tall and stocky. He was wearing a mask so I couldn’t get any facial features. There are 15 men in the staff and 7 fit that description.”

“Where are you at with the missing person reports?” Reid asked.

“Right, that. I’ve found 13 matches.”

“13 other victims?” Morgan questioned.

“Unfortunately, it seems so,” Garcia confirmed.

“He started killing before last night,” JJ stated.

“And he’s gotten away with it up until now,” Jane added.

“He must have been able to discard the bodies at the end of the night without being noticed,” Rossi thought.

“If he has a message, those bodies will show up soon with the same paint on their faces,” Morgan spoke.

“Let’s have someone go back to talk to the owner again about our possible UNSUBS,” Hotch suggested.

Jane stood up. “Spencer and I’ll go back,” she volunteered, grabbing the keys to the SUV.

Hotch nodded in approval and she sped out the door. She beat Reid to the elevator and he had to hurry to catch up before it closed.

~~~~~~~~~~

Bless The Broken Road Masterlist

~~~~~~~~~~

Tag List:

@cynbx @neon-deanmon @drw0301bieber @notsosmartbutcute

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getreadytosmash · 7 years ago

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The Past that Smashed

Chapter 12

Carlos’s POV

I waited anxiously for Shorts’ arrival as I texted Carla that I messaged him. Carla sent me some of the S.H.I.E.L.D’s contacts by hacking in to the Hulk’s computer. I told her what to do since she was over there and I knew how to hack certain stuff.

I can be a clumsy and nervous looking guy, but I knew a lot of things about computers. I help Carla with ideas and designs for her movies and props because her parents told her to.

I even texted Dawn about this too. She’s a painter and a digital artist so she also helps make Carla’s background or any other environment.

My hands could stop shaking. I’m always like that ever since I was a little kid. I’m too cautious about everything but this was different. I usually worry about myself being hurt, but this is about Sam. My family, actually Carla’s family, loves him and I can’t believed what happened.

I was going to get a drink of my hot chocolate when I heard a voice.

“You better be telling the truth before I spill hot chocolate on you again.”

I screamed and jumped like a cat. He always like to be so fricken silent. But I couldn’t help but smiled that I get to see him again after years.

“Well, jokes on you. Haha….I already did.”

Hulk’s POV

It’s been almost two months that I been going to the past. Carla is providing any other information but it doesn’t really help us, we know that she is stalling for a bigger event. I couldn’t help but be excited to go back and see Sammy. I watch him grow up and sometimes I help him on some stuff and he will tell me stories about his family. His parents are actually nice people but have to work a lot and their jobs are far away so I can’t blame them if Phil has to look over Sammy, including Carla and Carlos.

Sammy’s mother is Marie Harper who married Arin Sterns. She has short mousey brown hair, like Sammy’s, with brown eyes like him too. She was always wearing cowboy boots with different types of flannel shirts and jeans. She is a horse caretaker that will go check on horses either from people’s ranches or other places that has horses like for racing. Sammy and her both love horses and will take Sammy to ride them too. Phil doesn’t like them since he was to scared of anything bigger than himself. She wanted to be a veterinarian but her parents didn’t let her go to college because she was a girl and they had the money if they wanted to. She grew up with six brother while she was the middle child. All of her brothers actually love her since their mother never gave them the emotional support since they were all men and are not “sissy”. She acts like the older sibling to the others and takes care of her children like she did with her brothers.

She supports her children and will try to do everything to help them. Even if she was sweet, kind, and always smiles, you really don’t want to see her angry.

Arin Sterns was a quiet man who is a big book work since he works at a bookstore. He has long dirty blonde hair in a low ponytail with black glasses. Usually he wears button up shirt including a vest and a tie with black dress pants and a brown trench coat with gloves. He also has bagged eyes since he likes to stay up a night to reading any book he has. Arin wanted to be an English teacher but his family was poor so he couldn’t go to college. He was an only child but felt very lonely until Marie has brighten his life. He always bring books home but people don’t see any books since they’re all piled up in their room so their children have space to move around the house. The flowers in the garden are his since he read books about the Victorian era secret flower language and loves the different messages they can give. He’s actually overprotective of his boys since, one they are boys and seen what they can do, two heard some stories about what happened to Sammy and Mattie since he hates snakes, three his parents were never there so he wants to be there for them, and finally he doesn’t want to lose them since that was his nightmare. Actually they are more protective of Sammy than Phil for a certain reason.

They are good people with good intention but everyone there are not there, that’s when Sammy’s in danger.

I even found out that Sammy’s full name is Samuel Arin Sterns while Phil is Phillip Thomas Sterns. Sammy has his father’s name for a middle name while Phil has his grandpa’s name from Marie’ family.

The Albizu family also like the Sterns too after the fire incident and have been friends ever since. Carla’s parent were Antonio, who works in gardening and Maria, who works in the kitchen.

However it’s Carlos family that brings trouble sometimes. He’s usually forgotten and his parents were never really proud of anything he did but judge him poorly. They never really taught him anything so that’s why he has no voice and doesn’t talk a lot to stand up for himself. He gets really nervous talking to new people of they are judging thin the same way as his parents and doesn’t know anything else since he is stuck at his house. Carla’s family will do anything to get Carlos out of the house and give him what his parents aren’t giving him. Carlos also has the worst luck in history since he trips on his own to legs and has butterfingers so lots of things fall from his hands. Poor kid.

Dawn was from Marie’s youngest brother, Nathaniel, who was her favorite and almost has the same personality likes her husband but was more down to earth and cared really less about anything else in the world. Dawn was almost like her father but express her feelings in art. She’s a really good artist and can use pencil, ink, paint, and other different things too. She has long, messy brown hair in a ponytail. She usually have large baggy clothes since they always have some sort of stain on them. Her mother was a painter too and looked exactly like Dawn but wore white short sleeves shirts with long skirts that touches the floor. Her father was an policeman who got injured in an accident and has a scar on his right cheek. Either way they were the Sterns’ favorite family that treats them well.

That was the problem. Dawn and her mother, Tiana, were the only one who likes them. The other brother’s wives hates them. Since Marie took care of them, they put her first and the other wives would get jealous of her. None of them can go one day without mentioning her. They all are housewives trying to look good and be stay at home moms while Marie cares less about her looks and loves the wild side. They think she have no class but the way the brothers treats her like a princess sometimes. They really don’t like the ‘good for nothing weirdo of a husband who only reads books’. Phil almost look nothing like the family so they like him only. And Sammy looks like his mother so that was their target. They will send their children to bully him and Phil will play along liking the idea of being superior to his brother. Marie and Arin both know about this and told her brothers but the wives kept on denying that their ‘angels’ would never do anything like that. The Albizu will send Carla to go with Sammy to keep an eye on him if they plan to visit. The aunts always insist that their children should play with Sammy and Phil and the husbands who has no idea what’s going on agrees with them too.

I can’t believe these people and their hatred for the Sterns. Now I know what Carla meant from his other family and how they praise Phil.

Right now I’m watching Sammy from the window, since I can’t fit inside the house, hiding his Halloween candy in weird hiding spots. Somewhere under the fifth pairs of shoes he had, inside of Millie that was a shark plushie, in a cubby hole that had nine holes but was in the sixth hole, and in the fourth pole of the bed. He hides them so Phil doesn’t eat them because he ate his already.

I just hope for the best for him while I’m not there. I will try my best to keep him safe, but for how long?

\This chapter was describing Leader’s family and I know how you have a drunk father for him but I put a bookworm dad. It’s his cousins and aunts are who hates them since I believe that it doesn’t have to his parents turning him evil that way. And now you know why Carlos acts that way. So yeah. BTW….Rag Doll is a guy. Sorry if I didn’t clear that out for you. More drama starts later. Hope you enjoy.\

(merry Christmas! And thanks for the story as a gift ;D. It's cool that I got to learn more about Leader's family and it makes me laugh how you give him a nice life while I just give him suffering. But man his family is so mean! I hope Hulk gets extra protective because of that. I was surprised at seeing that Rag Doll's a guy but thanks for letting me know. It's gonna go down when he sees Leader!)

#fanfic #The past that smashed #Hulk #Carlos #Rag Doll #submission

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anonwriter27 · 7 years ago

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Teen Spirit - Chapter Four :)

It was Halloween and the school had gone into overdrive. People wore costumes every day of the week and flyers were handed out to announce the various parties taking place.

Robb didn’t care much for Halloween; he had enjoyed it when he took his siblings trick or treating, but they did stuff on their own now. Except for Rickon; Robb could always count on his baby brother.

He walked past Talisa and her gang in the corridor, not even sparing them a glance, and walked to where Myrcella stood getting her books out of her locker.

“Hey, hows it going?” He asked and she smiled at him.

“I’m good thanks, I found a really good book for the project.” She answered and Robb adored the proud look on her face at her success.

“That’s great! We can look over it tonight if you want?”

Myrcella looked confused, “You’re not going out tonight?”

“Nah, Halloween’s isn’t my thing, you?”

“I love Halloween! I watch The Nightmare Before Christmas, eat cake, sing the songs...” Myrcella stopped herself, the voice in her head telling her she’d revealed too much.

She was brought out of her humiliation by Robb.

“We can do that tonight if you want?” He said.

“You want to watch The Nightmare Before Christmas with me?” She asked confused.

She used to have to hide as a child when she watched it. Joffrey didn’t like those movies, he had found them too scary. He always punished Myrcella when he caught her watching them, so she began to watch them on her laptop under the stairs.

“Yeah it sounds fun. We can hang out without doing work right?”

Myrcella looked over his shoulder to where the three witches stood. Talisa had been furious when she found out Myrcella was Robb’s project partner; two weeks had passed and she still glowered at the new girl.

“Are you sure?” She said pointedly.

“Absolutely.” He said, giving her a look that suggested he knew of her concerns.

“I’d like that.” She said shyly, looking down at her feet so he wouldn’t see her blush.

“Great, I’ll meet after class and we can watch it at my house. Sound good?” He asked.

Myrcella nodded and watched him leave to go to class. She felt that weird fluttering in her stomach again. It was the same feeling she got when they touched hands when he passed her a book, or the time he laughed at something she had said. She only got that feeling when she was with him, and like all the times before, she would ignore it.

…………..

Winterfell was beautiful and nothing like anything Myrcella had ever seen before.

Despite its somewhat bleak colouring and dark undertones, there was something oddly comforting about it. Everyone seemed real; back home Myrcella found everyone to be fake, their words saying something different to their eyes.

They hopped off the bus and walked up to Robb’s house. When they entered Myrcella could smell gingerbread and her stomach demanded to have some.

“I’m home!” Robb called out as Myrcella took off her shoes.

When Myrcella stood up she was greeted with a plate of gingerbread men smiling at her. The woman holding them was beautiful, with long red hair and kind blue eyes.

“Mother this is Myrcella.”

“Hello dear, I’m Catelyn.” She said, her voice as warm as her smile.

“It’s nice to meet you.” Myrcella said in a small voice.

Catelyn smiled at the young girl. She was shy and sweet, she hid behind her hair and twiddled nervously with her fingers. ‘Yes,’ Catelyn thought, ‘I like this girl.’

“We’re gonna watch a movie if that’s okay?” Robb asked.

“Of course! Here, take these with you.” She said handing him the plate, “Be careful they’re still a little hot.”

Robb bent down to kiss his mother on the cheek and headed to his room. Myrcella was stunned by how loving they were, she couldn’t imagine Joffrey being so kind to their mother.

“Sorry about the mess.” Robb said nervously as they entered his room. His desk was littered with books and papers.

“Oh it’s fine!” Myrcella insisted.

She sat on the end of his bed while he went to find the movie. His room was very him, she thought. It was filed with wooden furniture, dark oranges and reds found in the lamp shades and duvet.

“Found it!” He said and popped it into the DVD player.

“I thought this was a Christmas movie?” He said.

“It’s a Christmas AND Halloween movie, which means I can watch it for three months straight.” She said proudly and Robb shook his head and laughed.

They sat back on the bed, and while Myrcella was watching the movie, Robb was watching her.

She got all excited, wiggling when her favourite songs came on. She would hum along to the tune but Robb new she would be singing it if she were on her own.

……………..

It got to the end of the movie, when Jack and Sally sang ‘simply meant to be.’

“Do you have that?” Robb asked. “Hmmm?” “Someone you’re ‘meant to be’ with?”

“Oh! No… I’ve never, ummm…” “ I see.” He said, sensing her discomfort.

The song had finished before they spoke again.

“Do you?” She asked. “Hmmm?”

“Have someone?”

“I’m not sure,” he said, “I mean, I hang out with Talisa, we’ve kissed but… I don’t think we’re meant to be.”

“I see.” She said, ignoring her fluttering stomach.

They were interrupted by a knock on the door. It began to open slowly when a messy head of curls popped out.

“Yes Rickon?” Robb said.

Rickon looked up then; he was a cute little boy with big eyes and a toothy grin, he was wearing a skeleton costume (He’d just come back from trick or treating with Bran). He walked up to them, his head lowered a little and stood in front of Myrcella.

“Hello.” He said and he blushed. “Hello.” She said smiling at the sweet little boy.

“Myrcella this is Rickon, Rickon this is Myrcella.” Robb introduced the pair.

Rickon was only six, but he had the charm of a gentleman. He took Myrcella’s hand and kissed the back of it, just like he had seen in one of Sansa’s movies.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you.” He said, and Myrcella giggled.

“Alright Romeo, now what did you come in for?” Robb asked, amused at his brother’s antics.

“I heard you were watching a movie, but I see it’s finished.” He said, his voice sad.

“We can watch it again!” Myrcella said, not wanting to let the little boy down. They both turned to Robb, pleading looks on both their faces.

“Alright.” He said, and lifted Rickon onto the bed, a smug look resting on the little boys face.

They devoured the gingerbread men between them, they sang the songs together, scolded Oogie Boogie together, and smiled together when Jack and Sally were reunited

When Myrcella left that night Rickon vowed to marry her one day, much to the delight of their parents.

“I wish I had met her.” Ned said, noting how Robb blushed.

…………….

Myrcella was on a cloud her entire journey home. The Starks were lovely and she had enjoyed spending her evening with them, even if her stomach was in nots. She texted Ygritte when she got off the bus to let her know she was fine. Despite her relaxed attitude, Ygritte was a worrier.

When Myrcella got home she was surprised to find how cold it was. She turned on the lights and saw the windows were open. Myrcella was concerned but assumed she must have forgotten to shut them.

She walked into the kitchen and opened her cabinet to get a drink. Every glass had been shattered.

She turned around to look at her living room, the rug had been ripped up into little pieces, all scattered on the floor.

‘No.’ She thought.

She looked toward the front door but he was already there.

“Uncle Tyrion doesn’t keep a close eye on his address book.” Joffrey said.

“Why are you here?” She asked, her voice shaking.

“There’s a party down the street, thought I’d check it out. But then I remembered my sister is here. I thought she must be missing me, seeing how she hasn’t called, or visited in months.”

“I was going to…”

“Imagine my surprise when I knock on my little sisters door, and she’s not home. How do you think that made me feel?”

She could have ran, she could have screamed for help, she could have done anything; but the second he raised his fist, she knew there was no escaping.

…………….

“Hey Stark!” Ygritte called out.

“Hey, what’s up?”

“You seen Myrcella? I’ve been trying to call her all morning but she’s not picking up. Hodor and Osha went to visit her at her place but she wasn’t there.”

Robb was worried now, “She got the bus home from mine last night…”

“I know, she texted me when she got off the bus, but I haven’t heard from her since.”

“Hey!” They heard from a distance.

They saw Osha and Hodor running at full speed towards them. Jon and Theon joined the group, both seeing the look of worry on Robb’s face.

“Everything okay?” Jon asked.

“Hodor, Hodor!” Hodor yelled, tears in his eyes.

“Easy big guy, what happened?” Ygritte said, trying to seem calm.

“We bumped into the night manager of the building Myrcella lives in,” Osha started, “He says she was rushed to hospital last night.”

“What! Why?” Robb asked unable to mask his fear.

“He said some of her neighbours found her in a really bad way, the door to her flat was left wide open.”

All of them looked at each other, each wondering what could have happened to Myrcella Baratheon.

……………

She knew she was in hospital, she could tell by the bright lights and foul smell. She hated hospitals.

“Hello Miss Baratheon, can you hear me?”

She nodded.

“Are you feeling any better?” The nurse asked.

She nodded.

“Do you want something to eat?”

She nodded.

“Can you tell me what happened?”

Myrcella took a deep breath and turned to the nurse.

“I fell.”

#robbcella #robb x myrcella #Catelyn Stark #Ned Stark #Robb Stark #Myrcella Baratheon #rickon stark #Joffrey Baratheon #Ygritte #jon snow #theon greyjoy #osha #hodor #talisa maegyr #bran stark #game of thrones #modernAU

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thorntonkrell-blog-blog · 5 years ago

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Spellchecked

EARLY BOOMER, LATE BLOOMER

I chose my Christmas gift 25 years before I was born. I chose wisely. On that day, Mary Keenan, who had just arrived bag and baggage in Rochester, New York from County Cork Ireland, gave birth to her first child…and named her Mary.

I sent that child the twinkle in her Irish eyes. Young Mary went on to celebrate another 91 Christmas birthdays. I was around for 67 of them as she was glad to see my father and her husband who saw my twinkle when he returned from the Philipines at the end of WW2 which made me part of a significant demographic excess known as the Baby Boom. When my father was in the Phillipines and during his entire time in the service, my mother wrote him a letter every day.

 I am an early Boomer and a late bloomer. When she was child, she raised her brother and two sisters as her father died suddenly when she was in high school. She lived to be near the bedside of all of ‘em when they passed. Same with my father, she comforted him till he died in her arms.  I was the oldest of her three children. She loved me and supported us, every day of our lives.

 I never bothered to ask her to thank me for choosing her above millions of candidates to be my mother while I was in my first infinity before my vacation before my next and final infinity. And I know I’ll see her again. 

The stars twinkle.

 Mary’s granddaughter is our youngest child. Of course we named her Mary. Yes, Mary Dear. Your twinkle brought your Mom and I together thirty years ago. Thank you for that. 

There is a theory which states that if ever anybody discovers exactly what the universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. 

Yes, there’s ANOTHER theory that this has already happened. I have a theory that it happens over 300 millions times every day in the United States alone.  The initial discovery is called death and the something even more bizarre and wonderful is called birth. The vacation in between is called life or some say “lipstick land.” All of us on earth at this moment share a common state of inexplicability which we project as the “universe” or “reality”. We create this reality as we go along living our lives in a state of mass hypnosis, love and wonder. Eventually we straighten things out, kick the bucket and re-awaken with only a vague memory of what we knew before. This vague memory is called our subconscious. With each awakening we discover a brand new universal puzzle to contemplate along with a brand new set of people also contemplating the same puzzle with slightly different kaleidoscopes. The most immediate, influential people we call our parents. 

And you, dear Mary, call me Dad. The tools that worked best the last time, even though we don’t remember them, are called aptitudes. When we discover them, we use them to explain the universe to ourselves and others particularly our children. I get the feeling I’ve written this before. I get the feeling this is what all writers are writing about all the time. All singers singing about all the time etc. I get the feeling you’ve read this before, Mary. Of course it’s all just a theory. I am still alive, honey.  Aren’t I ? 

MIDNIGHT MARY

Today is the first day in Rochester that we can all wear shorts. Thank God.

Today is also the 25th birthday of my youngest daughter Mary.

Mary was born at midnight so it's always hard for me to figure out which day that was as midnight I can go either way so I celebrate for two days and even that is nowhere near enough. The celebration should be continuous.

The hospital listed her birth at 11:58 but I noticed that the clock in the delivery room was a few seconds past midnight when the antenna emerged. I joked to the delivery doctor that we just made it for the extra day in the hospital. About an hour later, I discovered that they had declared her birth at 11:58. Around here, you get two days in the hospital for a birth. Because they listed the birth at 11:58, they counted that whole day as a birth day which meant in reality we got one day and two minutes of hospital service.

Bastards

Health Care

Two minutes which weren't legitimate in the first place.

I know she was born at midnight. I have video to prove it but didn't bother to fight the bureuacracy in the midst of such joy.

So Midnight Mary came into being wearing an antenna on her head. The doctors were monitoring her heartbeat in the womb and had attached a heart beat monitor to her head which looked like an antenna when she emerged at Midnight.

Yeah

25 years ago.

Now flash back four months ago right after the biopsy. I learned I had cancer and bone scans would determine how far it had spread. The interim of waiting for the bone scan results was the most "spirtitual" time of my life.

I was ready to go if go I must but I prayed to be around to celebrate the birthday of Midnight Mary and to be wearing shorts while celebrating.

I prayed for this day right here

My prayers were sincere

So pardon me while I celebrate

And forget all sorrow

Today is worth the wait

And so is tomorrow.

AVA”S SHOWER

When we moved to Tumbleweed, we had to enroll Mary in a brand new school. She was in third grade and had a broken leg. She arrived in time for school pictures. When the class pictures came out, I noticed this little girl with big glasses. Her name was Ava. I pointed her out to Mary and said “She looks like she’d be a good friend.” Sure enough, they became besties and remain so to this day almost 30 years later.

 This is the story of Ava’s shower.  I know this wasn’t a dream because when I dream I always try to snap in the dream the picture but the camera never works. It was my first bridal shower. My gender had always rendered me ineligible for such celebrations but this shower was co-ed. We were enjoying our drinks and conversation downstairs when I noticed that the main female stars were missing.  Ava was trying on her wedding gown upstairs.

I’m not sure who invited me but somehow through the grapevine I came too know that I would be welcome in this room and so would my camera. This happens often in my dreams but in my dreams, the camera she don’t work. I walked up the stairs and entered the room. I was the only male but everyone seemed to welcome me.  Everyone was admiring Ava in her dress. Ava was radiating joy and reflecting the admiring glances that were coming her way. The dress was perfect. Everybody knew it.

 I’ve been taking Ava’s picture ever since she was a little girl. I wanted to get a great picture of Ava at this moment. All of my years of photography had led to this moment. It wasn’t gonna come again. Ava noticed me. She looked into the camera. I snapped. The camera worked. This was no dream.  Mine wasn’t the only camera in the room. Ava seemingly picked up on all of the lenses by not concentrating on any of them but rather enjoying her moment of celebration. A model of decorum. I got my pictures. Everybody got their pictures. The cameras disappeared. I lingered with my lens. 

At that moment, at that second, in about the time it takes a car to swerve a deadly swerve, Ava’s expression changed. For an instant.. memory, vulnerability and sorrow flashed through her entire being in a collision of joy and pain. I imagine she was thinking of her older sister who was not in the room.

The older sister Abby who ended up on the deadly end of an unsignalled swerve on a dark Halloween night almost 10 years ago. A tragedy that changed everyone. Suddenly Abby was in the room.  I didn’t see Abby but I did see Ava seeing Abby as did my camera. For one split second grief and recognition flashed across Ava’s glowing face. In that split second I had to make the decision whether or not to snap the picture and “capture” this exceedingly private, candid, personal and vulnerable moment. I was almost certain that the camera was going to malfunction revealing the entire scene as one more dream forever undocumented. I snapped. 

The camera worked. Ava’s expression returned to joy. A few weeks later, I told Ava about the picture. I told her this story. I told her I wanted to write about it but couldn’t do that unless she approved. She said it would be an honor. The wedding is this weekend. This writing is in honor of Ava and of Abby.

   HEADING FOR FRONTIER AT LAST

  Today’s the day. Last night was the night. I only had to steal one mirror last night so I got my first half way decent shuteye in months. At this moment I am resisting the urge to hit the sack and indulge in fatigue.

 I’m thinking about the original Invasion of the Body Snatchers and Nightmare on Elm Street. In both of those flicks, sleep was to be avoided unless you wanted Freddy to slash through your walls or wake up as a pod, a poisoned pod. 

Those movies always bothered me.  I hate the feeling of falling asleep when I don’t want to fall asleep. This used to happen to me all the time, particularly on Wednesday nights when I was young.  Because I was big fan of horror films, my parents used to let me stay up “late” to watch Shock Theater which played all of the Lugosi, Karloff and Chaney films. Frankenstein, Dracula, the Wolfman, the Raven, the Mummy, the Black Cat, The Invisible Ray,The Ghoul,The Werewolf of London etc. The show came on came on past my bedtime so it was quite a privilege and quite a challenge.  Plus, I was actually scared by the movies or at least I expected to be. 

I would take my position on the carpet in front of our timy teevee set. The movie would start and before too long, I would realize that I was falling asleep. I learned to recognize the feeling and the “oh no” that accompanied it. I would invariably choose to “rest my eyes” for just a minute during a commercial. I learned after awhile that once I started to rest my eyes, the rest periods would increase in frequency and duration until at last I was asleep on the floor and had to be carted of to bed all the time insisting “I’m awake, I’m awake”

 The morning came and I awoke with a sense of failure and a determination to make it all the way through the next week. I realized that once I started to “rest my eyes”, it was all over. I would make a conscious effort to “resist the rest” but week after week I failed. I wasn’t used to failure back in those days and it frightened me more than the movies did.

I was learning about temptation and my inability to resist it. This was my first previews of fatigue but I really didn’t know what fatigue was until a few months ago. There’s a difference between fatigue and being tired, passing out, blacking out, dozing off or being exhausted. For the past few months, I’ve suffered fatigue and it’s a lot different from “resting my eyes” because in fatigue I’m not even interested in the “movie” that is my life. All I want to do is sleep, well not exactly sleep but more like escape but even in the escaping there is the over-riding sense of failure and guilt as days melt away and merge with nights. Fatigue sucks. 

So as I write these words, I am resisting the urge to “rest my eyes” and to go downstairs to my cave/pit. The urge is strong but not as strong as yesterday and yesterday wasn’t as strong as the day before. They told me after my last blast of radiation that sometimes the fatigue starts to go away after a week and a half but sometimes it can continue for three or four months or in some cases forever. 

Today is exactly a week and a half since my last blast. I’m gonna go the distance. I’m not goin’ downstairs. I’m not gonna turn into a pod person again today. No way. I’ve charged up my camera. I’m snapping flowers. I’ll be leaving for the ballpark in three hours. I’m gonna look good. This is the day I marked down on my calendar for the beginning of my comeback and I’m not gonna rest my eyes until I get back from Frontier Field. My brother is my best friend and I haven’t seen him during this whole situation. I want to see him now. I want him to see me snapping pictures, keeping score, drinking a beer and rooting for the old home team. Freddy Fatigue can’t get me at Frontier Field if I keep my eyes on the ball. 

THE OLD BALLGAME 

One of my colleagues, a guy named Fred, got into as much trouble as I did for having classrooms that were not quiet. Neither Fred nor I thought the criticism and penalization were justified but we did have “long hair” at the time and we were considered “popular” by the students. 

 Eventually, thank God, the concept of beautiful noise in the classroom began to take hold. Beautiful noise means the kids were buzzing and working with each other and with the teacher. Nothing on earth sounds like productive buzzing.  It was a far cry from the spray and pray method formerly preferred by the fearful badgers of the ruling realm and their supportive administrators. Quiet in the classroom was no longer a guaranteed good thing. 

Suddenly, Fred and I were seen as “innovators”. People started imitating us and when they got good at it, they began to instruct us on how to do what we had been doing all along, since we had already moved on to the next thing which they were currently against but soon would be imitating and then instructing. On and on and on and on etc.

 Meanwhile, my classes were getting busier and buzzier so I was headed for trouble. Quiet is so much quieter when it’s surrounded by buzz.  One day Fred and I and about fifty teachers were at a workshop run by a consultant who hadn’t taught a public school class in years but who was paid more than we were to look at our watches and tell us what time it was. The consultant was also on the lookout for new ideas which he could steal and profit from when he took his carnival on the road., always searching for a new parade to jump in front of and declare himself the leader etc.

 So the consultant called on teachers to “share” new ideas that they had. Most of the “sharing” consisted of ideas that people like Fred and I had been criticized for by the same people who were now “experts” at whatever “technique” they were sharing. The consultant gushed over every “insight” no matter how unremarkable.

 Meanwhile, Fred was in the back of the room trying to stay serious. Fred was a big, dark haired dark eyed handsome guy who wasn’t lacking in self confidence and didn’t need or want to be drawn into this festival of self congratulation. Even though Fred hadn’t raised his hand to volunteer a response, the consultant decided to call on him. “Do you have a technique, Fred, that you’d like to share?”, the consultant asked in an overly friendly way. 

Fred said “Well, I guess I could share what I call 'the old ball game’.

  The consultant perked up. "I’ve never heard of that technique, Fred. It sounds very interesting. How does it work?”

  Possibly a new parade was forming. 

“Well” said Fred, “if I see a kid’s not paying attention, I throw a tennis ball at him/her. That usually gets their attention.” 

Fred was serious. I looked at Fred’s face. Fred was looking at the consultant’s face. The consultant had no idea what to say. Nobody ooohed or aaahed. I burst out laughing which broke the silence.(I had used the same “technique” myself" on quite a few occasions except I didn’t use a tennis ball. I used a bunch of tinfoil that I had rolled up in a ball for my version of “the old ball game”. I called my tin foil ball “the egg of unexpected courage”. The kids called it THE EGG.) 

Back to the seminar…… Fred started laughing. The consultant sorta smiled Once again, Fred and I were operating on the same page even though we weren’t aware that we were until Fred answered the consultant. I had no idea that Fred also used “the old ball game”. This is one of my fondest moments because “the old ball game be it tennis or tinfoil” actually worked and probably still does today. I am afraid, however, that a few months after this moment…..some consultant somewhere was instructing teachers on the effective use of what has become known as “the old ball game”. 

Beautiful.

   ADVERB ANGST 

Call me Very.  I’m an adverb. I’m angry about that. I’m common. I’m used and abused all the time. I don’t even get the complimentary “ly” that some of my mates get. My ancestors had it for awhile when people knew how to talk. Remember “verily” or “yea verily”.  Those days are gone.

 Now, I have to submit to those fancy pants “ly” adverbs e.g. “very quickly”. “Quickly” at least gets to modify a verb, an action word of some kind, maybe even a passionate action like “kissed”.

Then I arrive. I diminish the kiss by making it even less soul driven, less selfless, less sensual, more furtive, dismissive and distracted.  See, I hate situations like that. I’m jealous of “quickly” who’s nothing but a verblicking sycophant passing himself off as an expression of time.

 It’s a bit more tolerable when I submit to an adjective. At least an adjective bows to a person, place, idea or thing; tangible, usually visible, often alive, occasionally intelligent almost always miraculous.

 Action verbs are my cup of tea but let’s face it action verbs ain’t exactly nouns. Action verbs need nouns to give them meaning. Nouns don’t need action verbs they can exist quite well l thank you on verbs of being. After all, what is a human but “being”.  Even when modifying an action verb I usually need an “ly” to make any sense  I am uncomfortable modifying verbs of being. “very are” won’t cut it. Neither will “very is”, “very was” nor wishes neither not "very could" or “very would”. Speaking of the subjunctive, I wish i was more existential. Hell I’m barely essential. I’m actually an add on although ever since teevee came along and people forgot how to talk, a lot more “very” are in use today.  I’m designated Very Mask Neg Neutral which means I am the very that can be only used to describe Masculine Negative to Neutral Adjectives, verbs or other adverbs such as  cumbersome,lethargic, immature and

uncommunicative incompetent self-absorbed smarmy frantically and sloppy Making them each a little worse. My girlfriend is also an add on. She’s a Very designated Fem Neg Neutral. She gets to work with feminine negative to neutral adjectives, verbs such as  bitchy bloated perfunctory over-sensitive Superficial Moody Slutty Vengeful and air headed. The classes above us are Very Mask Positive And Fem Positive. They work with courageous dedicated authentic Athletic Intelligent Capable gorgeous resplendent intuitive sensual supportive nurturing and erotic 

Do you see why I’m upset?

Very upset. They’ll terminate us low class adverbs when and if we stop being over used. When and if people stop watching teevee and texting. When and if people start articulating and valuing vocabulary rather than gloss. In other words, we’ll be around a long time.  A very long time. Some of the higher class verbs were even used as adjectives for a bright, shining, glossy time as in “She is soooo very”

 I once had to modify a very Pompous adjective, negative implication of course as in “He’s very, VERY”  Thank God that particular trend, that monstrosity has retreated for awhile. My woman, Very Fem Neg Neutral has a real bad attitude. She gets it from her job. Look what she works with bitchy, bloated, hyper-critical etc. Still between my anger and her attitude we still managed to get busy and have babies. Our babies are the “kindas”. They’re even more inarticulate than my woman and me. I’m kinda afraid. Kindas are the adverbs of the future. I am very kinda afraid. 

CROSSWORDS

  Way back in another lifetime, when I was teaching kids how to write, my class used to do the New York Times crossword puzzle together every other Monday. The puzzle gets more cryptic, arcane and oblique as the week continues. Monday is fair game for high schoolers working in tandem. Tuesday’s puzzle maybe. Saturday’s forget about it. Maybe that’s why we don’t have school on Saturdays except for Breakfast Clubbers who are puzzled and puzzling enough with or without crosswords.

Crossword puzzles serve as an exercise not only in vocabulary and exactitude but also in breadth of knowledge. Crossword puzzles are to writers what shadow boxing is to boxers or what ping pong is to tennis players or driving ranges to golfers, a truncated version of a more pervasive obsession.

Aside from their value as literary barbells, crosswords teach one of life’s most valuable lessons. If you have one wrong word or a right word in the wrong place, it screws up the rest of the puzzle. We can’t insist that a word is right if it is wrong. Will power only extends so far. It can’t be right simply because we want it to be right and we’re good people. That’s called willfullness. In the words of Johnny C, “if it don’t fit, you must acquit”.

Somewhere in all puzzles, before we abandon original thinking or stick with our misconceptions, we confront wavering allegiance to a shady word choice. Since most of our lives are spent re-inforcing our own biases, wavering allegiance is a frightening flourish of vulnerability. In America, especially in politics, it’s all about being “right” first and then sticking with that righteousness in the face of hell or high water, fire and fury. Wavering allegiance is a forerunner to change. All change includes loss and all loss requires mourning. Who wants to mourn? Who wants to admit a mistake?

In politics, to flip is to flop. So when we stick with wrong words in Crosswords, we never solve the puzzle or the problem contained within the puzzle, a problem that grows more pressing with every passing day. Usually national problems come in the form of dollars and cents, bread and butter, black and white , war and peace, red and blue. Hey if we come to a cross roads where we should turn right and instead turn left, don’t worry if we drive completely around the world we’ll end up going the right, right way. Once upon a time on my way to Iowa from South Dakota, I made a wrong turn and drove halfway through Minnesota. With a crossword puzzle, we can just take out an eraser. With a war, with poverty, with racism, with recession, with division we need something more than rubber at the forgiveness end of a pointed stick of lead. Every day seems like a Saturday crossword.   

ALI, FRAZIER, CHUVALO AND EVELYN 

Slides. Remember slides? You’d throw your slides into a Kodak Carousel and voila…a light show up against the wall. Needless to say I threw quite a few slides against quite a few walls over the years as I told my Ali stories. I liked one of the slides in particular.

 I made a nice 11 by 14 print from that slide . Ali and Joe exchanging punches during their second fight at Madison Square Garden. 

We all got older as the years passed. It seemed like Ali and Joe got older faster than everybody else. What else could we have expected?

 During this time of great decline, George Chuvalo added to the pugilistic tragedy.  George Chuvalo The Croatian Crusader. The Heavyweight Champion of Canada. The human punching bag and common opponent for the vastly more talented Ali and Frazier. The man who could not be knocked down. The man whose face had launched a thousand fists. George Chuvalo had a face that had been sculpted by other fists into the face of a fist

. And then after George retired, life stepped in and continued the battering. He lost his wife and sons to suicide. Heroin was very involved. Still George refused to hit the canvas. Word got through to his old opponents, Ali and Joe, that George was hurt and staggering but that he refused to go down. A boxing organization in Rochester decided to throw a benefit dinner for George. Yeah it was a band aid on a shotgun wound but every little bit helps. 

Joe Frazier decided to attend and waive any fee. So did another wounded warrior name of Muhammad Ali. Ali was shaking from Parkinsons and Joe could barely see. Joe and Ali didn’t usually appear together. Bad blood existed. People wondered why after all these years bad blood still existed between Ali and Frazier. The answer is simple. These guys tried to kill each other three times in front of the whole world and they damned near succeeded. He jest at scars who’s never felt a wound.

 There was a lot of laughter that night but nobody was laughing at the scars. I was there too. The Chuvalo benefit cost a hundred bucks to attend. My ringside seat at Ali-Frazier fight also cost $100. So much had changed. One thing hadn’t changed. The 11 by 14 photograph that I took at Ali Frazier 2 looked exactly the same. The two of them stalking each other in the middle of the ring, young and heallthy and with all the lights shining on them. I brought the picture to the benefit.

 I had met Muhammad, Joe and George individually but I never thought that I’d see all three of them in the same room at the same time. Yet, here we were for the common good of Chuvalo In the lobby, I got a chance to visit with boxing expert Burt Sugar and HBO analyst Larry Merchant. They both reacted to me as if I had pissed myself while wearing a white suit.. Arrogant and a million miles away from Ali in terms of engagement and humility, these two celebrities brushed off my questions about the sweet science with an insolence worth mentioning here. Vampires I left those “famous guys”. I was relieved to leave. I entered the main room.

I found my table. My name was still not Sinatra nor for that matter Sugar or Merchant so my $100 dollar table resembled my “ringside” seat in terms of physical distance from the action. And I wasn’t even at the same table as the Son of Sanford.  I shared a “way in the back” table with another human who also had connection/complexion problems; a stunning middle aged African American woman named Evelyn. We had the only two seat table in the place.

Evelyn and I chatted for awhile about the value of our $100 as compared to the $100 spent by the more connected, very Caucasian, very male attendees flaunting upfront and uptight. We figured we were outsiders. We bonded. I showed her my 11 by 14 photo. She liked it and said “be careful with that. It’s valuable”.

 Evelyn had a mission of her own. Evelyn told me that she knew Joe Frazier and the last time Joe was in town, she really got to know him and he got to know her. She planned on having a little chat with Joe later in the evening about his previous method of leaving town. She assured me that Joe would be paying attention.

 All the stars were already seated miles away at the main table. All the stars that is except for Ali.  It’s only fitting that the champ enters last. All of the other guys had entered from the front of the venue. When Ali and his entourage entered the room, they came in from the back. As soon as he entered the room, the whole environment changed for the better. He walked very, very slowly. Since he came in from the back, the first table he passed was the distant table for two.

He stopped at our table. He looked right at me and although it seemed impossible, I got the distinct feeling that he remembered me from our morning at Deer Lake decades before.  Evelyn noticed the look and asked me after Ali had passed us, “does he know you”.  I told Evelyn that I had spent some time with him a long time ago. Whether he recognized me or not, he once again gave me that wonderful feeling that I was cool with him and that our table was the best table in the house. and that, once again, made me feel cool with myself  although he couldn’t possibly have remembered. I guess that’s what charisma is all about.

 Like I said, I had met Sugar and Merchant, ten minutes before they took their upfront seats. I’m sure they had already forgotten about me and their vibe would have amplified that disregard. Not with Ali. I started feeling great.  Important The whole room turned back to see the old champ. I got the feeling that everybody in the room started feeling great for different reasons. Uplifiting Transcendent . Eliciting smiles and cheers with every step, the Champ caned his way to the front. Everybody in the place was experiencing rampant, contact joy. I don’t think that Frazier was feeling that joy although he probably remembered feeling a lot of contact. It was obvious that Joe was feeling pretty dang great before he even entered the place, if ya know what I mean.

 Obviously, a lot of feelings fly around a room when Ali enters that room and walks toward a partying Joe Frazier.  The dinner began. Neither Ali nor Frazier addressed the audience; for different reasons. Chuvalo expressed his gratitude towards both men for showing up and making his benefit such a success. Weirdly enough if a three man boxing match broke out, Chuvalo would probaly win even though both Joe and Ali had batterred him in the past. 

Merchant and Sugar blabbed some and sucked a bit of energy from the room although their wisdom has slipped beneath the radar screen of both my memory and contempt. When the program concluded, the master of ceremonies, a born bullshitter named Jerry Flynn announced that for a half an hour the head table participants would be willing to sign autographs. 

Immediately the rush to the front began led by the people sitting in the front. 

From the way back table, we watched the crowd in front gain full advantage. We only had a half hour and it looked as if there were two hours of people in front of us. We did a little spontaneous human calculus. Evelyn headed towards Joe. She had more than an autograph in mind. She had a piece of her mind in mind and she was about to give that to Joe.

 I headed for Ali, by far the longer of the two lines. Somehow, my 11 by 14 print caught the eye of somone in Ali’s entourage. He asked me to identify the picture. “Ringside, Madison Square Garden, Ali-Frazier II” “Diju take dat picture?” “Yes I did” “Champ prolly like to see it. C'mon” 

He escorted me towards the front of the line, not the very front but a definite improvement on my table rank. Ali and I were in the same force field. I knew he’d have time for me even as the minutes ticked away. With about 10 minutes left in the opportunity, our chance came. I put my picture in front of the Champ. He considered it carefully. He was in no rush whatsoever. Then the familiar whisper that he either said or sent. I’ll never know which but the message was clear…“choo take this?” “Yeah Champ I did’ Another whisper/send "it’s good” Then the eye contact. Ali and me eyeball to eyeball again. Same eyeballs that had been eyeball to eyeball with Martin King, John Lennon, Sonny Liston, Elvis Presley, Nelson Mandella, Joe Louis, James Brown, Stallone, Duvall, Carson, Borgnine, Malcolm X, Ross, Chamberlain and infinite others were inviting me to come on in and stay a minute. Make yourself comfortable Join the crowd. Maybe u been here before He gave me his beautiful Parkinson’s signature. Very slow, very painful, looking up every few seconds directly in my eyes as if this were the first signature of his career given to his best friend. Ali had signed another piece for me at Deer Lake decades before. Like the man himself, Ali’s signature had changed dramatically over the years. His Parkinson’s signature took a good twenty seconds to make with five separate lookups and included only the fragments of four letters….. M…a…l….i. Ironically he made his mark over Joe Frazier’s image in the ring in my picture. He hit me with the feint again although this feint was very faint yet still overwhelming. I thanked the champ. Again the eyes. Again the illusion of recognition. Again the electricity. So long champ. 

Still five minutes of the half hour remained. Wow Pause Shift Recalculate I got a shot at Joe. Where’s Evelyn. There she be. Evelyn chillin’ with Joe “Hey Evelyn” from fity feet away with four minutes left. “Hey Ice, c'mon up here and meet Joe.” Once again the Red Sea miraculoulsy parted. The Red Sea thought Evelyn was Joe’s wife and I was a friend of Joe’s family. I got to the table with time to spare. Evelyn said “Joe, this is my friend. Sign his picture” I put my picture in front of Joe. Joe looked at my picture. “dijoo take this picture”

“Yeah I did, Champ” “good picture” Ironically, Joe signed over the image of Ali in the ring in the light at Madison Square Garden, young and beautiful. Floating Getting ready to sting forever. Evelyn gave Joe a peck on the cheek. Joe took a sip from his beer. I gave Evelyn a peck on her cheek. It was the last time that I ever saw any of them. Time was up. Ring the bell. 

   FAMOUS MIKE CAN DRAW

 Some stories are so lovely that I hesitate to write them. Some legends are so fragile and delicate that I’m reluctant to reveal them. Here’s a lovely story and a delicate legend all in one.

 I’ll try to do them justice before the memories fade completely as the blur increases every day. I remember his first day in class. He was fresh off the boat. I mean that literally. He was a boat person from Viet Nam. He was in my English class. He didn’t speak a word of English. I didn’t know what to do with him that first day so I somehow signalled/sent him to the main office to pick up an attendance sheet. 

The secretary at the main office was expecting a student from another class named Mike. When my student arrived, whatever his name was, it wasn’t Mike. Helen asked my new student if his name was Mike. He didn’t know what Helen was saying but he knew a question when he heard one. He nodded his head up and down. Helen said “Here, Mike”, and gave him the papers. He returned to my classroom a few minutes later without the attendance sheet but with whatever administrivia Helen was supposed to give to “Mike”.

I took the paper from him. I said thanks and asked him what his name was.

He said “Mike”

 I said “Hi, Mike”

 That’s how Mike got his name. Aside from the single word “Mike”, Mike spoke no English. We were a pair, Mike and I.  Mike would come into class, take his seat and listen with great patience and attention to the academic tumult engulfing him. I knew something of the concept of linguistic immersion wherein a person learns a foreign language more quickly by surrounding himself with it. I believed this was happening with Mike although I didn’t know for certain. I did know that in this case English was the “foreign” language to Mike and he was surrounded. 

One day after a couple of weeks, I noticed that Mike was taking “notes” of what I was saying. I couldn’t imagine what Mike’s notes looked like so I casually made my way to his desk to sneak a peek. Mike’s “note” was a surreal and photographic drawing of a rose. As I looked at the rose, I was amazed as much by its sensitivity of rendering as I was by its virtousity. Near the drawing, I wrote the word “rose.” Then I said the word “rose” I spelled the word “R..O..S..E”

 Mike smiled and said “rose”

 I took a risk. I had a feeling the risk would be approved by Mike. I announced to the class. “Check this out, everybody. Mike can draw.” Everybody crowded around Mike’s desk. Everybody look at the rose. Everybody flipped out. 

Everybody started saying “Mike can draw” Eventually Mike got the message. He spoke his first English sentence in English class. This is what he said. “Mike can draw” He smiled. Time stood still. I’m here to tell you, Mike could draw. Many scholars praise the efficient linguistic style of Julius Caesar, how much he could say with how few words. All of France is divided into three parts. Has anyone ever said more with fewer words at the beginning of his story. This is the beginning of Mike’s story.

 Mike not only continued to draw but he also continued to listen with purpose and intention. Mike observed not only with his eyes but also with his heart and mind. Mike’s vocabulary began to grow as he listened and observed. Nouns first then verbs then adjectives. Here’s the story of the first adjective I can remember. One day, I walked over to Mike’s desk and noticed that he had been sketching a portrait of himself. On his portrait, I wrote a bunch of nouns with arrows like “mike” and "nose" and “eyes” and “ears"and "head” and “neck” and “body”. I pointed to each word and said it. Mike repeated the word with me. Then I added the adjective. I wrote “famous”; drew an arrow to the picture of Mike and said the word. 

Mike hesitated a second and then asked “Mike famous?”

 I said “Yes, Mike is famous” Mike startled me with his reply.

 “No, Mike not famous. You, Mr. Rivers…you famous.”

  I realized that Mike’s language skills were blossoming with as much beauty as his drawing skills. From that day on, every time I saw Mike I would always say. “Here’s the famous Mike.” And Mike would always say, “Mike not famous. Mr. Rivers famous.” We would laugh. We were connected. Sure enough, Mike WAS becoming famous, at least in my class.

I was running the school newspaper at the time. I asked Mike, still using arrows, objects and printed words if he would draw a comic strip for the paper. He drew the strip. The school read Mike’s comic. His character was a lion, The school loved it. Mike’s fame grew. His audience expanded. By this time, everybody in my class knew something rare was happening with Mike and his art, kids were always crowding around his desk to see what new drawings were coming alive

. About this time, I suspected that had Mike developed a crush on Kathy.  I discovered this when Mike showed me a picture of Kathy that he had been drawing. Mike was stylizing Kathy rather than photographing her with his rendering. I immediately recognized Kathy even with her stylized, over sized Disney girl eyes. I wrote “Kathy” on Mike’s paper and drew an arrow. Mike blushed and smiled. I could tell Mike wanted another word from me, an adjective perhaps so under Kathy, I wrote “beautiful” and drew another arrow. Mike put the drawing away. His portrait of Kathy was not an image that he intended to show to the class. Not only were we connected; we had a secret.

 A couple of weeks passed and Mike’s language skills kept growing. One day, he took out the picture of Kathy and showed me something new that he had added. He showed me that he knew how to change and adjective into a noun. Under my printing of “beautiful”, Mike had printed a word of his own. This is the word that Mike had printed in painstaking calligraphy.

 Beauty 

Beauty is truth and truth is beautiful. I was facing a beautiful truth in my professional life as well as a crossroads. I was given the opportunity to write a grant under the auspices of the Federal Career Education Incentive Act Grant Program, the purpose of which, as the name suggests, was to help secondary education become a better link to careers.  I proposed my very first grant. The proposal was funded for $500,000. In my proposal I visualized the creation of an intern program. The idea was radical at the time. I was chosen to be the administrator for the project. I would have to leave the classroom. Leaving the classroom was the crossroads and a difficult factor in the decision. When the kids heard what I had done. They were proud of me.

Mike came to me and said “Mike not famous, Mr. Rivers famous.”

 I left the classroom.  I left Mike in the capable hands of the Art. Dept particularly Larry Pace. Larry had served his country as a Marine in Viet Nam.

The day that I left, Mike showed me his private sketchbook. In his sketchbook were dozens of drawing of Kathy.  Underneath each sketch; a single printed word: Beauty.  

By the time I got the Intern Program running smoothly, moving it from dream to imagination to realization, Mike was back in my life. Mike had made breathtaking progress in language and art and had begun to crystallize his dreams. Mike had grown to love classic Walt Disney cartoons and wanted to become an animator.  I had heard that fantasy from other students before and I would hear it again but with Mike…well he had a dream, spectacular discipline and dedication. I had an intern program. Uh, let’s put two and two together and see if it comes out four, twenty two or five.

 I contacted the only artist in town who specialized in 16 millimeter matte animation, a guy by the name of Brian. I told Brian about Mike. I told Mike about Brian. I brought the two of them together at Brian’s downtown studio. With Brian’s encouragement and equipment along with the ongoing help of the high school Art Dept, Mike created his first animated cartoon. He had even learned to play the guitar well enough to supply his own music to the animation. In Mike’s cartoon one of the characters was a lion. Mike asked me, because I was “famous” to provide the voice for the lion. Mike’s cartoon was eventually selected in an extremely competitive national cartoon contest to be shown on Nickelodeon. Mike’s cartoon was one of the best student cartoons in the country. Little ol’ famous lion voice me was roaring on television sets across America. 

Mike was only a sophomore in high school but he was already thinking about college and colleges were thinking about him.  Anything was possible including truth , beauty and fame. Mike was most interested in beauty. He had discovered that the Disney studios regularly hired interns from the California Institute of the Arts. Mike knew about internships. He had completed four of them in high school.  In the meantime Mike had taken all the art courses at the school plus four more at Rochester Institute of Technology and had aced them all. Mike spoke a lovely version of the English language, the direct, clear, soft and kind version rarely used by native speakers. Mike could draw.  Mike could talk. Mike could write, words and music. Mike could play the guitar. Mike had a resume full of A’s, internships, art work, awards and a cartoon that had played nationally on Nickelodeon. Mike applied to the California Institute of the Arts. We were all happy but not surprised when Mike was accepted and scholarshipped.

 Mike was ready for another journey. I was on a bit of a journey myself. My first marriage was breaking up although I didn’t realize it or perhaps was denying the realization. Mike had never been to a rock concert in his life so at the end of the school year, the night after his graduation I invited Mike as our family guest to see the Moody Blues at the Canandaigua Performing Arts Center. Mike accepted the invitation. You’ll hear more about THAT later. After the concert, Mike left for California.

I haven’t seen him since. Here’s the last few things I heard about Mike. In college, his skill and interest continued to blossom. As an undergraduate, he applied for and completed an internship at Disney Studios. Upon graduation from college, Mike was hired as an animator by Disney. His first screen credit appeared at the end of the Little Mermaid, listing Mike as an animator of Ariel.

Apparently Disney liked Mike because his next assignment was a substantial promotion. Mike would be one of the main designers for Beauty and the Beast Mike was helping to create Belle.  By now, everybody knows WHAT Belle looks like. Only a few of us know WHO Belle looks like.

Beauty, if you will, looks exactly like the sketches of Kathy that Mike labored over so mightily, so beautifully, so passionately, so innocently and so truthfully during his junior high days. Kathy is Belle. Kathy is  Beauty. 

Some stories are so lovely that I hesitate to write them. Some legends are so fragile and delicate that I am afraid to relate or reveal them.  Remember? Well, I tried. As I tried, I kept flashing back to the writers who brought us the legends of the Old west, those scribes who turned big nosed, shiftless, violent, alcoholic William Hickock into the great Wild Bill, the handsome hero who died, shot in the back while playing poker and holding the deadman’s hand…a pair of aces and a pair of eight . A cardinal rule for those writers was, according to John Ford in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, “if you come to a crossroads between truth and legend, write the legend.”

 The legend of Mike and Kathy is the loveliest local legend, I’ve ever personally encountered. I’m part of it; a small part but yes I was there in the very beginning. I can vouch for everything until Mike left for California. I can vouch for the similarities between Mike’s sketches of Kathy and the rendering of Beauty.  Every once in awhile, when I reminisce about my teaching days, I like to think that I was the guy who had something to do with the inspiration for the creation of Beauty. And ya know what?  It’s a beautiful feeling.  Maybe even true. Next time somebody you know mentions truth, beauty or Beauty and the Beast tell 'em this story. That’s how legends grow. 

AFTERNOON ANGEL

I know for sure it was a Tuesday afternoon. I don’t know if it was the first time I smoked weed, such moments are hard to pinpoint.

Today is also a Tuesday afternoon. Today I found out that Ray Thomas, the flautist for the Moody Blues had passed away from prostate cancer. I know something about cancer. The beauty of metaphysiction is its ability to go flash forward and backward at the same time while flirting with the eternal and the imaginary. 

The Tuesday afternoon that begins this story happened fifty years ago. I was shooting footage for a film that I was making in graduate school. My idea was to simply walk around and shoot whatever came into my lens on this Tuesday afternoon and call whatever came out “Tuesday Afternoon” It was during this activity that I might or might not have smoked a joint because I know the guy with me was a “weirdo” at the time who definitely smoked the rope. I had shot enough weird footage so I was confident that within the images, I could find 10 solid minutes that would represent what a Tuesday afternoon looked and sounded like and that it would probably be interesting to watch in say 50 years so that I could clearly remember what fifty years ago looked and sounded like. 

Yeah, maybe I was loaded as I recall that thought process. 

We were driving back to campus. We turned on an FM station. By this time I was an album guy and FM was the album station. I was trying to figure out what music I would use in the background of the film when on the radio came “Tuesday Afternoon”. I had never heard anything like it before. When the song was over, the announcer said “that was Tuesday Afternoon by the Moody Blues from their new album Days of Future Passed” 

Days of Future Passed might as well have been the name of my mind set on that Tuesday afternoon with Tuesday afternoon playing. I hoped that I would see the Moody Blues in the Future and at that time, remember the past which would naturally include the moment I was living.  I knew the Moody Blues. I knew of their hit “Go Now” which I wasn’t crazy about. I didn’t know that the personnel of the band had changed and they had gone from THAT to THIS. Ray Thomas was in both versions, I learned later.  Shocked, stoned and stunned by synchronicity, I became a Moody Blues fan. In other words, I too was a weirdo. At the time you had to be a little weird to like the Blues. They were hanging with LSD guru Timothy Leary and proud of it. I couldn’t believe that “drug music” could be so beautiful or that a simple Tuesday afternoon could be so profound . 

I had the music for my film. I found my film in the music. 

Now let’s fast forward 15 years. My first marriage was breaking up although I didn’t realize it or perhaps was denying the realization. I know I felt like I had a ton of bricks on my back. The “famous” Mike had never been to a concert before and he loved the Moody Blues. I invited Mike and a couple of friends to join my family at the Moody Blues concert at the Canandaigua Performing Arts Center. Mike accepted my invitation.

 The night of the Moody Blues arrived. I had purchased a dozen tickets for the show.  The day of the night of the Blues was very hot. I ran ten miles that afternoon trying to lighten my load. My brother, my sister, my wife, a few of our friends, my son Beau, Mike and I made the short trip. We walked to the gates. I took out the tickets. I only had eleven tickets. Everybody was looking at me. I counted the tickets only eleven again. I was going to have to exclude someone from the concert. I looked around at the faces. I knew I would exclude myself.

I looked at the tickets again. I counted the tickets. I looked at Mike. My marriage was falling apart. Mike was on his way to California. I had screwed up the tickets. I had ruined Mike’s first concert. I could feel the earth spinning. I said something incoherent to my brother. He looked at me with concern and said “whaaa?” I spoke again and once again sounded like Gregor Samsa after his metamorphosis. I started to stumble. The tickets fell out of my grasp. I looked directly into my son’s eyes as the weight on my shoulders flew off and I fell in slow motion towards the ground. As I looked into his eyes, I realized that I was watching a son watch the death of his father. I wondered how this would affect him him. I heard my wife scream “he didn’t go to his physical”

 I hit the ground I knew I was dead. When I opened my eyes some time later to see what heaven was like I saw two faces. One face was of a beautiful, elderly woman. The other was Mike. This was Mike’s first minute at his first concert. In the background Moody Blues music was playing. The elderly woman whispered her phone number in my ear. It went right into my permanent memory She told me to call anytime and that the more I called, the more I would want to call. Eventually I wouldn’t even need a phone. I still remember the number. I call it everyday. The number is/was a prayer. I called it before I started writing this, seeking help to get this right. Phone? I don’t need no stinken phone. 

They wanted to call an ambulance. I didn’t want that I wanted to go where the music was, where the angel was. Somebody picked up the tickets and found all twelve. We went inside the Shell and heard the Blues. The woman had disappeared once it became clear that I was going to live. The last time I saw her, she was listening to the show. The Blues may or may not have been playing Tuesday afternoon when our eyes met. 

Flash forward Today, Tuesday, I learned that Ray Thomas had died. Ray was 76 years old. I’m 71. How could all of those future days have passed. 

I’m calling the number.  The number is a prayer.

 IN THE PACKAGE 

Mr. Baseball remained in his coma for months. It was the bottom of the ninth and his team was behind by 100 runs and there were two out and two strikes on Mr. Baseball. One more strike and he was out. Game over. That was the situation the last time that I visited him at the Community hospital. 

Time passed. Mr. Baseball kept fouling off pitches, his faithful loving wife Rosie by his side. Rosie figured that maybe things would improve if they moved Baseball to his home ball park. Still in his coma, Mr. Baseball was transported to his home. 

Home plate. 

His home plate was far away from my homeplate. We didn’t visit in person, overwhelmed as were with our own ballgame. 

When he got home, minus a few tubes and some drugs that hadn’t worked, Mr Baseball out of nowhere, hit a homerun. He came out of the coma but remained bedridden. We didn’t know about the rally, we had left the game a little early. We knew that he was home and we had his phone number.

One day, Lynn called the number and Rosie answered. The rally was still going on. Therapists were pitching now and Mr. Baseball continued to swing away always bolstered by Rosie who was as encouraged as she was encouraging. She told Lynn that a speech therapist was pitching at the moment. She whispered to Mr. Baseball that Lynn was on the phone. He understood; another base hit.

Rosie put the phone up to Mr. Baseball’s face.

Lynn said “Hello, Mr. Baseball.”

  Lynn’s 'hello’ was like a hanging curve ball. Mr. Baseball took a mighty swing and said in a slow, soft, labored voice “Hi Lynn.” Home run. Grand slam.  

Rosie took the phone back and explained the progress Baseball had been making. He was scoring on the coma. His therapists were amazed.  He scored 200 runs and beat the stroke.

 Meanwhile he had developed cancer. It was the cancer, not the coma that finally ended the incredible rally. 

We went to the funeral. Mr. Baseball looked good almost as good as he looked the time he caught a foul ball barehanded at Frontier Field. In my dreams, he shows up at his funeral and he, Rosie, Lynn and I go off to dinner as if nuthin’ had happened. He even makes fun of me for imagining that everything wasn’t perfect. We paid our condolences to Rosie.  

A week later, we got a package in the mail with Mr. Baseball’s address as the return.

 In the package was the fiber optic bear.   

 NON-FICTION IS THE NEW FACTION

In my dreams, my camera is always broken at times like this.  My camera was shattered. That suggested, I might wake up so I decided to go with the dream a little further to see what would happen. I went to my video camera. It seemed to be working. Uh Oh. This might not be a dream. 

Whatever it was, if I could tape it…it might help. I turned on the camera. It worked. The semi had come to a stop about 150 yards in front of us. The driver was still in the cab.  I pointed the camera in the other direction and noticed a person coming towards us. I kept the camera aimed at his face so I got a closer up look than I would have without the camera. I focused on his eyes. His eyes told me that he thought he was looking at a couple of ghosts. When he got within speaking distance, I put down the camera. “I saw the whole thing. I thought you guys were goners? Are you okay?”

 I wasn’t sure. We walked around to the side of the van. Lynn was leaning up against it. I kept the video running.  The tape would later be seen at least three times on national teevee.  Moments later, the police arrived. Lynn explained the collision with astounding calm and clarity. I was no longer taping. They arranged for our totaled van to be removed from the median. They gave us a ride to a nearby hotel. They explained our situation to the folks at the front desk who set us up with a room although all of our belongings were still in the van.They lent us a room pro-bono. Everybody told us not to worry.

 We found out that we were in La Grange, Indiana.  All we had was the clothes on our backs. And the aid of better angels.

 I was teaching summer school. I was a teacher all the way. I taught twelve months a year. No house painting for me. I had been going twelve months a year for ten years with only one break in between. I didn’t teach in the summer of 87, the year that I met Lynn. Lynn was a single Mom when we met. She was raising three daughters. I was a single Dad raising a son and a daughter. Her kids liked me and my kids liked her. We spent a lot of time together especially on the weekends when I had custody of my two. Lynnn was working part time at First Federal Bank. She was good with change. She balanced every day. She could find the errors when someone else failed to balance. She didn’t stand for a lot of bullshit that’s why she was checking the boat when I suggested a road trip test. 

My prior experience as a road warrior had convinced me that you don’t really know a person until you’ve been on the road with them. I had made the trip from ocean to ocean three times before I got married the first time. I regretted the fact that I hadn’t road tripped with my first wife before we got married. Although two children had to be born, we might have saved ourselves some nightmares. I had rushed into that first one and wasn’t gonna rush into this one. Two years had already passed with Lynn and me….our bodies were at rest and would tend to stay at rest unless acted upon. Times of indecision. We had both already been married. We both carried the scars. 

We had met one enchanted evening when she walked up to me and asked me if I wanted to dance. The first song we danced to was “Hurt so Good”….John Mellencamp. The second was “Loving You” by Elvis. The third was “It’s All in the Game” by Tommy Edwards. When Tommy was about to sing the words “then he’ll kiss your lips” I decided to take the chance. I kissed her lips. She kissed me back.  We had been together every day since and it was going on two years. Two wonderful years.

Time to clarify.  Lynn made a decision. She said we should get married at the local justice of the peace. She called it to question one afternoon when we were having lunch at Mario’s on East Avenue our favorite Italian restaurant.

 Justice of the peace was no place for me or for us as far as I was concerned. She took it as a rejection of her love which was the opposite of my intention.  For the first time, we began to wonder about the future of the relationship. Yet, we had booked a trailer for a weekend at Darien Lake. We decided to make the trip.  We had a couple of our kids with us. They were having a lot more fun than we were. They were outside the trailer when Lynn handed me a tiny article from the Democrat and Chronicle. The article said “The Field of Dreams is a real place.” 

All of a sudden it was clear to me. I am a person of intuition which means I have a tendency to say out loud exactly what is flashing through my mind at the exact time that it flashes. The flash came on. “ Hey Lynn, If we were ever to get married, it would have to be at the most beautiful place in America. Our love deserves it. If you’re willing to travel to Iowa and if we can find this place and if it’s real we could get married on the spot….right at home plate.” 

She made a face that I couldn’t decipher so I didn’t take it as a rejection. Then she said “Great idea. I’ll call up Iowa and tell them we need a marriage license to get married at an imaginary place at an undetermined time.”

 I found out later that she thought I was nuts and bullshitting her at the same time. We had seen the movie together earlier in the year. we both thought it was great. In one scene, Kevin Costner (Ray Kinsella) asked his wife Amy Madigan “is this heaven or is this Iowa” as they relaxed one starry evening on the diamond that he had carved into his cornfield. The location was so exquisite that I thought perhaps it was the most beautiful place I had ever seen. This was the place for us. Plus we would give the relationship the test….a test that I firmly believed had to be taken by any couple in the tentative situation that we occupied.

I enjoyed teaching summer school because I got a chance to pay attention to the kids who had been lost along the way during the regular school year. I was always amazed with the progress they made when given that second chance. So the question lingered, if we were going to take a road trip when would it be. Lynn had her schedule at the bank and I had mine at the high school.

During the regular school year, I taught twelfth grade English as well as Creative Writing. I also taught an elective called Cinematic Literacy. I created that one myself and it was a great success. I was approaching the peak of my teaching career. I had ten days at the end of August, beginning of September. 

Lynn had a week of undefined vacation saved up. We had originally met on July eleventh 1987 or as we called it 7/11.

On our two year anniversary, we went out to dinner at the very restaurant where Lynn had made her first proposal a month before. Midway through the meal she said “I sent away for a marriage license in Iowa. The field is located in Dyersville which is near Dubuque. We have a license waiting for us in Dubuque.” Of course I was surprised but since I hadn’t been bullshitting her about the road trip idea, I said “that’s great. Good job.”

 I didn’t know if she had actually procured a license or if she was reality testing . I was mystified when she said “so if we break up this summer at least we can always say that at one time we had a marriage license in Iowa when we tell our story”. 

All through the month of August, we came up with reasons to take the trip and those reasons were roadblocked by objections, obstacles and realities. If Lynn wasn’t exactly rocking the boat during those weeks, she was damned sure checking for leaks.

 One night, we watched Close Encounters of the Third Kind. We loved the flick and mixed it into our plan. If we headed west we would go as far as Devil’s Tower in Wyoming and if we hadn’t made up our mind to get married by that time, we would head back and know that we had tried goddamn it, we had tried and we had a Iowa Marriage license to prove it. 

It was also becoming clear that if we hadn’t made up our mind to try the road trip before school started, it meant that we probably should wrap up the relationship as painlessly as possible. On August 25th, I called Lynn from my apartment and said “I was ready to go if she was”. 

She wasn’t ready and she hung up sorta pissed off. This was the last possible day to make the trip and be back in time for school. A couple hours later, I heard a knock on the door. It was Lynn. She told me the van was in the parking lot, packed and ready to go if I was serious. I ran into my house, packed a few things. I climbed into the van. “Let’s go”.

I said. “I’ll drive” I drove the first leg. We found rest area deep in Ohio. We napped for a few hours. Then we went into the rest area and washed up. Lynn came out first and went behind the wheel. I started to climb into the van when an impulse struck me. As I was leaving the rest area, I saw a machine selling bio-rhythm cards. I decided what the hell…I went back and bought a card for that day. It only took maybe an extra thirty seconds. I didn’t like what the card said so I threw it out. That thirty seconds would be crucial as we were headed for a blind spot that we might have missed if not for the card.  We managed to arrive at the blind spot exactly on time. Yeah, the whole crazy pilgrimage was my idea. I talked her into it, yet it was her van that was smashed to bits.  

One way or another, the journey was over. We were alone together in a motel in LaGrange, Indiana not far from Touchdown Jesus and the Golden Dome of Notre Dame. I was beginning to get a grip on death. As we traveled from the wreckage to the hotel, I asked what time it was. When we got to the hotel, it was a half hour before the time it was when we were on our way to the hotel. Someone explained that we had crossed the line separating one time zone from another. We had left Eastern Daylight Savings Time. That’s when I began to realize what death is/was. This was eternity. When you’re dead, you’re in Indiana and you keep crossing between time zones and Touchdown Jesus forever. 

Time stabilized for awhile in the hotel. I was expecting hysterics, blame or disassociation from Lynn. Instead, I got calm, composed, courageous capability.She started working the phones. She had a handle on what happened. She called her auto insurance company back in New York. She explained the situation…..car totaled, hotel in Indiana, etc. They wanted to know what her plan was. To my astonishment, Lynn told them that she wanted to continue on with her journey. She outlined what she needed and what she expected to make that continuation possible. Following that she called the American Automobile Association and got from them what we needed to continue the journey. A few minutes later, a rental car appeared at the motel. We drove around a bit, looking for a place to eat. We lost and gained two or three hours in that fifteen minute search.  

After “lunch” we made our way to the junkyard to take a look at the van. “Yep, it’s totaled”, the junkman asserted. We gathered our belongings from the van and loaded them in the rental. I could not have been more impressed by any companion. Even though I wasn’t sure whether we were alive or not, it was clear that we were inhabiting the same realm. It was a realm, I wanted to remain in for the rest of my life/death.

I got down on one knee in that junkyard and asked Lynn to marry me. She accepted. August 26, 1989. What a day. What an eternity. And the pilgrimage was still on. We didn’t know if we were dead or alive but we knew we were getting married. We didn’t know where. We had a marriage license in Iowa. We had been looking for the Field of Dreams which we heard was in Dyersville.

We drove through that town. There’s a lot of farms in Dyersville and a lot of corn. We couldn’t find the farm that we were looking for. We were hungry, tired, not sure if we were alive and headed for a place that might not exist. We were in a rented van.

 We saw the driveway to yet another farm and turned into it, past yet another corn field. When we got to the farm itself, it was most definitely not the Field of Dreams farm, it looked more like the Cujo farm. We got the hell out of there but not before some giant thing flew out of the corn, through my open window and onto my chest. I don’t know what the hell it was a bird, a locust, a demon grasshopper? I don’t know, I just grabbed whatever it was and threw it out the window toward the cornfield or the hell from whence it came.

  When we reached the end of the driveway safe from Cujo and the flying thing, I pulled the van off the road. I realized that I had gone crazy. Here we were in the middle of Iowa for God sake. We were lost. We might be as totaled as was our original van. All my fault, all part of yet another crazy dream that I had dragged Lynn into.

 We turned right at the end of the driveway. We drove about a hundred yards.

And then…we saw a paper plate…..nailed to a tree….on the plate two words and an arrow…..Movie site….arrow pointed right. 

We took that right turn and a half mile down the road, there it was….The Field of Dreams. No doubt. Right exactly out of the film and out of my dreams. Perfect. We drove down that long driveway and met a man who was working in the yard. I asked him if he was the owner of the place. He said that he wasn’t but that the owner was out in the cornfield on his tractor. I saw the man on the tractor in the corn and walked towards him. He turned his tractor to meet me.  When we were about ten feet apart, he shut off the tractor and focused his blue eyes on me. “Can I help you?” asked the man on the tractor.

 I said, “I believe you can. We’ve traveled from Rochester, New York. We had a terrible automobile accident yesterday. I’m not sure if we’re alive or dead so tell me, is this heaven or is this Iowa?”

 He looked at me and realized that there was something going on here and he wasn’t sure what it was. Then he answered in the most perplexing way possible. “It’s whatever you want it to be.’

  I said, “whatever it is, it’s the most beautiful place I’ve ever seen. I want it to be the place where we get married.”

 He said “You can do that.”

 I asked “Would Friday be all right.”

 He said “that would be fine.” 

We shook hands. On that Friday, he would be our best man. His name was Don Lansing. I told Lynn the great news. We got in our car and drove to Devil’s Tower. We had originally said that we would go as far West as Devil’s Tower and if we hadn’t made up our minds by then, well we’d head back home and take a break. Of course, we had already made up our minds thanks to the junkyard proposal. 

That night, we stopped in Sioux Falls. A year earlier Sioux Falls had been the site of a horrifying tragedy. A plane crashed and there were no survivors. The plane crashed in a cornfield. We trucked through the Black Hills and the Badlands of South Dakota.We stopped at Mt. Rushmore where, I almost lost my wallet. We made a late night stop in Deadwood. We wanted to check and see if we were really still alive. They dropped fluorescent eye drops into Lynn’s eyes and checked to see if hemorrhaging had occurred. I’ll never forget looking at Lynn in that darkened emergency room with her glowing, green fluorescent eyes. The eyes were by far the brightest objects in the room. They okayed us for further travel as if anything could have stopped us now.

We stayed the night in Spearfish after spending some afternoon time wading through a few crystal clear South Dakota cascades, getting our feet wet, so to speak.

We returned to Iowa on Thursday night. Don greeted us warmly and invited us into the house. Yeah, the house in the movie. Don wanted to know what we were going to wear. All we had left were our jeans. Don went to the phone and called the local tux shop. They had one tux left. Don asked if we wanted a cake. We said yeah. He got on the phone and called the local bakery. He asked Lynn how big the cake should be. She said big enough for fifty. I laughed out loud. We didn’t know a single person in Iowa aside from Don and the guy who originally greeted us, a guy named Butch who was a caretaker for the field and his wife Annie. 

Then he asked Lynn if she needed a wedding gown. He knew a dressmaker in town. He called Anne Steffen, the local dressmaker. He described our dream and asked Ann if she could help out. She said that she could.

 That evening, we drove into town. The only tux in town fit me perfectly. Next we met Anne. She and Lynn got together and designed a wedding dress. That night we slept at Butch and Annie’s house and the rain poured down ending a drought. The next day, we went back into town. The dress was made. Beautiful like in a dream. We drove to the town office to pick up our wedding license that Lynn had sent away before we left on our pilgrimage. By the time we got to the office the word had already spread. We got our license. They told us that they had heard all about the plan and so had the local television station. The station wanted to interview us.  We met the reporter and she seemed very interested in our story. She had a full camera crew with her.

We told them that we had arranged for a magistrate to do the honors. We told them about the car crash. The town barber had heard about all of this and volunteered to give me a haircut while Lynn tried on her dress.  By that time it was getting late. We stopped at a restaurant to have our last meal as single people. We looked up at the teevee and there we were on the local news. We watched ourselves telling our story. 

We made it back to the house. By this time, a bunch of neighbors had gathered. I went into the room where in the movie Ray’s daughter looks out the window and says “something’s gonna happen out there.”just before the ghost shows up. I had the same view of the field and I knew that indeed something was gonna happen out there. We were gonna get married. The ghosts were gonna show up.

 I made sure I had the wedding ring which we had bought at Wall Drugs in South Dakota. The rings were made from genuine Black Hills gold. By this time about fifty people had gathered. I left the house and walked into the corn in left field. I figured that since I still wasn’t sure that I was alive that I should come out of the corn like the ghosts did.  I made my way to the pitchers mound where I met Don. I was on the mound for a few moments when the fifty people started to ooh and ahh as Lynn emerged from the house. Suddenly everything was in transcendent five dimension. I couldn’t have dreamed of a more beautiful bride. 

She made the long walk past the bleachers and crossed the magical first base line. She didn’t disappear. She met me on the mound and we walked together to home plate where the magistrate awaited. We took our vows with Don standing right behind us. The witnesses cheered. After the ceremony, we went back to the porch. The towns folk had brought fixings. We ate the cake together. They all wanted pictures so we posed for awhile. We drank some champagne that somebody had provided. We bid them farewell. The next day we were home. On the flight back, we told the stewardess our story and she put us in first class. Sitting right next to us was Maury Wills, the ex-Dodger shortstop who had once stole a hundred bases in a season. She told Maury the story and he congratulated us. We made it home in time for the Ring of Fire around Canadaigua Lake. We’re going to be celebrating our thirtieth anniversary next week. We’re still going the distance and easing each other’s pain.    

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allhallows-art · 8 years ago

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WRITING REQUESTS

So, I’ve decided to redo this shit I did a while back. A long time ago, I compiled a huge list of AU’s and I’ve decided to repost it. If you want a bit of writing done for the following people:

SuperMega Game Grumps Markiplier ( and crew including Tyler and Ethan ) HatFilms Sidemen Cow Chop CancerCrew Then all you have to do is pick from the list below, send the number to me along with who you want it to be about. I’ll try and get through them as soon as I can. They’ll probably all be shit and jokey bc that’s my writing style but I hope you enjoy Thanks to @apocalypto-12 for rekindling my love for writing and feel free to pick some Au’s and I'll write them for you babe

1. ‘my parents are rly religious and forced me to this meeting I hate everything the entire world is against me what the actual fuck did a stranger just send me nudes’ 2. I’m passionate about this cause and I will give you this flier if I must shove it down your throat 3. all our friends are drunk 4. it’s 3 am and I’m still in the library studying for finals and I’m losing my grip on reality and I think I just saw a ghost 5. We’re studying in the library and there are two people very obviously fucking in the stacks and we keep sharing embarrassed glances 6. You decked me in the head while you were playing frisbee golf 7. I’ve been sitting in this seat all semester why did you decide to sit in it today 8. my friend dragged me to this party and I just saw my ex quick make out with me 9. it’s 3am, in the dead of winter, some motherfucker pulled/set off the fire alarm and I am being very vocal about how I’m gonna make that fucker pay 10. you’re the fucker who set off the fire alarm with your awful cooking (or) I’m the fucker who set off the fire alarm with my awful cooking 11. dude your headphones are loud like I can make out most of Kayne’s lyrics and I’m sitting across the fucking room 12. you live above me and I’m going to murder you if you don’t stop throwing parties Sunday night 13. ‘me and my roommate decided to decorate our house for Halloween but got really into it, and ended up re-enacting several scenes from nightmare on elm street so loud the neighbours called the police to investigate screams’ 14. I broke your nose at a mosh pit 15. “You were chased by the cops, got in my car and just yelled ‘Drive!’” 16. “You broke into my apartment drunk thinking it was your friend’s house and I should call the cops but my cat kinda likes you so we’re good” 17. “You saw me reading the same book you did and we got into a heated discussion on how much it sucks 18. “My cat steals underwear and I come home to find you chasing my cat to get your underwear back.” 19. “This horrible umbrella won’t extend! Oh, shit I just hit you in the stomach/crotch! I’m so sorry.” 20. “I drunkenly tried to fight you and knocked myself out but you were kind enough to take care of me till I woke up.” 21. “I thought you were my friend so I slapped your ass in greeting.” 22. “I’m watching The Lion King on my phone and I’m trying to hide the fact I’m sobbing uncontrollably but you notice anyway.” 23. cat person and dog person meet at petco and their pets won’t stop hissing and growling at each other 24. we’re both ‘team leaders’ at a summer camp for little people and you may be hot but goddammit my collection of twelve-year-olds are going to beat yours into the dust 25. a mutual friend invited us to their laser tag party and we’re the last two alive on opposite teams and goddammit if I’m going down you’re going down with me 26. ‘I met you last night when you were drunkenly patting my dog in my backyard at 3 in the morning and when I asked you what the hell you were doing you slurred something about dogs being great and then you threw up on my feet and then fifteen minutes later you were passed out on my couch so that’s why you’re here right now also what the fuck is your name and why were you patting a dog in a stranger’s backyard in the middle of the night’ 27. 'last night was a haze for both of us and somehow we woke up hungover in a bed that isn’t either of ours and neither of us recognize this apartment we should probably get out of here before someone calls the cops on us’ 28. 'i found you sleeping on my balcony when I went out to water my plants why are you here and more importantly how did you get here we’re eighteen floors up’ 29. ‘I called the wrong number and started talking about my life and you only interrupted me after a few a few minutes of me revealing some pretty personal stuff and now your invested in my life troubles’ 30. ‘we’re two thirds of the threesome we had last night and we’re walking awkwardly out of the last person’s apartment together’ 31. ‘I’ve had a really awful day so I started kicking a car out of frustration and it turned out to be your car I’m so sorry’ 32. I always see you doing weird shit at ridiculous hours of the night and it makes me feel better because I do weird shit in the middle of the night too 33. “I’m going to need you to put on some underwear before you say anything else." 34. “So why did I have to punch that guy?” 35. “I hope you know that my name is actually ________.” 36. "That is the tenth demon summoning this week holy shit.” 37. “Why exactly do you need chloroform at 2AM?” 38. “You need to stop leaving dead bodies in my kitchen.” 39. I asked you to babysit one time and now my child keeps asking when you will spend time with them again 40. “I’m so sorry that my child pointed out how your shirt- actually never mind I agree, that shirt is horrendous” 41. “You’re drunk and walked into the wrong apartment and fell asleep on my couch oh god you’re going to be so confused in the morning” 42. “I’m at work and my son needs to be picked up from school do you mind?” 43. “Okay well it turns out you’re really good with kids and my son has started calling you daddy and insists we move in so ‘we can be a real family’” 44. “Our dogs whine whenever they’re apart so we spend pretty much every day together” 45. “I walked in on your ex yelling at you so you grabbed me and kissed me so she’d go away and I’m kind of freaked out I literally just met you last week” 46. I’m giving out candy for Halloween and you brought your little sibling trick or treating and I think that’s sweet 47. I accidentally egged the wrong house and I’m trying to apologize but it’s one in the morning and you’re pissed off and I’m so sorry 48. “I live below you and I was minding my own business watching the snowfall out the window WHEN I SAW A BODY FALL ARE YOU REALLY PUTTING UP CHRISTMAS LIGHTS NOW” 49. “our Christmas party turned into a tropical theme because the radiator is broken and it’s hotter than hell in here - damn you look good without a shirt I never noticed before asgdhfjgkhl” 50. You’re allergic to cats but my cat really likes you my bad 51. You caught me having a Barbie movie marathon and now I’m trying to keep you from telling anyone about this! 52. met at a family reunion but not related to each other 53. your kid hates my kid 54. Accidentally “parkoured” through your window and I must pay you back but I’m dead broke 55. It’s a rainy day and I see you get side-splashed by a car and I’m laughing so hard until I get hit too 56. Drunkenly sold my soul to a demon and now I’m their bitch but this might be not so bad 57. Work at the same shitty restaurant and have all the same shitty shift times 58. 'What the fuck are you doing its midnight why are you playing 'My Heart Will Go On' on the piano' 59. “I came up to your apartment to ask you to turn down your music and have quieter sex, but it turns out that you’ve just been jumping up and down on your bed in your underwear listening to music alone 60. 'I heard you singing backstreet boys at 3am and decided to sing along oops’ (other old boybands can be substituted) 61. 'I was walking by the roller coasters and SOMEONE’S SHOE FLEW OFF AND HIT ME IN THE HEAD 62. you’re the drummer for my brother’s band and I find you hot (bonus: the band is really shit and the drummer doesn't want to be there so uses the other person as an excuse to get out of practice) 63. we go to the same coffee shop every evening to do homework but we never speak to each other until today 64. I’m only your friend because we smoke weed and get high together 65.

66. “I want to blame my young child from accidentally breaking your window with a baseball, but it actually was in fact me, and I was aiming for your roof I am sorry 67. we have apartments next to each other and sometimes you’re blasting shitty music but other times you’re jerking off and that’s even louder than the music please quite down 68. “I’m a biker and one day I was biking in your neighborhood while you just happened to be outside watering the plants and since you’re so goddamn cute I accidentally steered into a pole and now you’re giving me first aid (holy shit you’re even cuter up close)” 69. “I’m at a karaoke bar and I’m sober enough to realize that your voice singing my absolute favorite song is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever heard, and you caught me staring and winked at me oh shit" 70. “it’s 2 in the morning and I was just trying to get home but I left my sunroof open all day and now there’s a squirrel in my car and it scared me and I drove into a pole – would you please stop laughing you’re a cop. you’re supposed to be helping” 71. “you can’t get tattooed drunk, come back in the morning and if you still want my name on your ass we’ll talk" 72. ‘I walked into the public bathroom at a mcdonalds and you’re dangling halfway out of an air vent do I even want to know what you were doing’ 73. ‘I found you on the roof of my house passed out with a black eye holding a fire extinguisher’ 74. I accidentally texted the wrong number with a cat meme and you replied back with a different one unexpectedly and we just kept going ‘till I was convinced I would marry you 75. I’m best friends with your brother and when we were face-chatting you walked past in your boxers and bent over to pick something up and I tried averting my eyes but that ass 76. Detective partners 77. Reincarnation 78. Childhood friends with adjoining houses/rooms 79. This is the end of the world and we’re all we’ve got 80. I keep calling tech support because you’re helpful and your voice is cute 81. Competitive buskers who eventually for a band 82. Pen pals who vent to each other every week 83. Working at a theatre together during midnight premiere of a blockbuster 84. Meeting while waiting for hours in the a&e 85. Panicked yelling in unison because of lost baggage between connecting flights 86. Book store 87. Reluctant team mates who save the world together 88. Stuck in an airport because our flights were very delayed and it’s like 2am 89. Pretending to be siblings because of reasons 90. Teaming up to rescue respective abducted children 91. Trapped in a bank during a robbery 92. I’m pretending to be your bff bc you look very uncomfortable with that person at the bar 93. New fbi partner is hot 94. You accidentally shipped this weird thing to my apartment 95. Inappropriately timed confessions 96. At a ski lodge somehow got stuck outside in a storm hey look an abandoned cabin logically thinking go inside for warmth 97. Oops friend looks like the only place to sleep in this house is this small twin sized bed guess we are sharing 98. Inappropriately timed proposals 99. Called the wrong number while drunk 100. Hitchhiker 101. Arranged marriage 102. Fallen angel 103. Fashion designer 104. Zombie apocalypse 105. Backpacking across Europe 106. Mermaid 107. Band on tour 108. Small town lovers 109. Ice skaters 110. Dancing partners 111. Singing partners 112. Lawyers/ detectives 113. Writer and editor 114. Photographer and model 115. Stuck in a lift together 116. Phycologist and a patient 117. Partners in crime 118. Dystopian 119. Utopian 120. We both got kicked out of our rooms bc our room mates are hooking up and we are now avoiding each other 121. Laser tag 122. Walked by a rollercoaster and got hit in the head by a shoe 123. Swim team 124. Got mistaken for a celeb by their biggest fan 125. Sorry I set the fire alarm off for like the forty ninth time I tried to cook 126. I’m a werewolf but I’m embarrassed to tell you bc my wolf form is more like a Chihuahua 127. We both tried to rob a bank at the same time 128. Mistaken identity 129. Trapped on a desert island 130. Lab partners 131. Runaway royalty and a confused commoner 132. Android ad human 133. Immortal and non-immortal 134. Detention 135. Time travel 136. Came to the wrong Halloween party 137. Pranked the wrong person 138. Accidentally scared a kid and their adult is angry at me 139. Rival super heroes trying to save the same small town 140. Neighbours who only met because “I cannot get this stupid jar open can you help?” 141. We made a bet at the beginning of laser tag guess who won pay up 142. I’m on the FBIs most wanted for killing a ton of people but dw I just wanna date you bc your face is smoochable and you give me butterflies 143. Life sized version of clue in an old abandoned manor 144. Reunited after surviving zombie apocalypse 145. “are we both robbing the same house?” 146. Kissed them as a distraction to steal their wallet 147. “you know you’re singing out loud to your headphones, right?” 148. “I think my dog likes your dog” 149. Little kids getting way caught up in make believe 150. Lives alone in the woods next to a waterfall finds a confused lost person walking round 151. Fighting a squirrel 152. Spy 153. Private security 154. Angry biologists 155. Historians 156. Crazy cat hoarder and frustrated allergic to cats neighbour 157. Modern royalty 158. Got up at 2am for snacks at the store and found you trying to sleep in the hallway bc your roommates have his fiancée over and I guess I’ll lend you my couch 159. My cat went into your apartment through an open window and likes to piss everywhere and ruin furniture and now your back home from the store and you found me in the middle of your living room but I promise I’m not a burglar 160. Its 3 am and as much as you have a great music taste people are trying to sleep 161. My best friend somehow broke me to and tonight it the season finale of my fav to show and no internet streams are working can I watch it on you to please I promise I’ll go back to my apartment once it’s over 162. “I moved into the apartment next door and its totally haunted crash I crash here tonight” 163. “I may or may not have just robbed a bank and please help me get away I will pay you in sexual favors also cash” 164. “I don’t know you but you were at that party last night and long story short I now have your name tattooed on my ass2 165. “my friends dared me to go on this rollercoaster and now we are at the top and it looks hella scary and hello hot person next to me careful I might puke” 166. You thought you were alone at the bus stop early this morning so you started singing fall out boy loud but your Patrick stump impression could use some work and I’m not afraid to point that out 167. We’re rival up and coming singers and every time one of us releases a song the other covers it to try and make it better. We’re also always trying to out cute each other and top each other but half our fans ship us; our agents use this to their advantage and decide we should do a duet bc it would be popular but now we are in the studio together and I know and I kinda wanna know how your lips feel 168. Help I cannot find my cat and I know its 3 am but me and Neil cat rick Harris would appreciate the help 169. I’m a computer hacker trying to hack government systems but accidentally hacked your computer as you were searching up sex positions and looking at questionable porn 170. I’m a fandom blogger and you’re an aesthetic/fashion blogger and I accidentally followed you through that Tumblr radar thing but you’re too cute to unfollow 171. I sent you one of those ask memes Reponses saying that I would date you but we’ve never talked and you live half way across the world but now you’re interested whoops 172. You started banging on my door at 3 in the morning bc you got the wrong apartment and now I’m inviting you in for tea to bitch about the person you thought lived here 173. Person A accidentally falls in the pond trying to reach something and person B is a bystander who can’t help but laugh 174. Person B must grab person A from falling into the t6raintracks because they did stay behind the yellow line 175. you’re a store clerk and oh no I just spotted my ex can I hide behind your desk thingy 176. We’re neighbors and we’ve never talker but your cat may have gotten my cat pregnant guess we’ll have to raise a kitty family together. 177. A toddler broke your nose and I may or may not have snapped my thumb n an intense game of Mario kart and now we are sitting next to each other in A&E 178. I tried to rescue you from being robbed but got knocked out and you had to take me to the hospital after getting your wallet stolen 179. I purposefully get your coffee order wrong so you will talk to me again 180. I work at the checkout ad you are clearly not old enough to buy that 181. We are both con artists scamming each other 182. My hamster escaped and I think he went under your door 183. “Hey we hooked up last night and it turns out you’re my child’s teacher” 184. “we are neighbors and every night at 3;14 you start yodeling?? Why?? Is that you yodeling?? Its been two months??” 185. “I woke up this morning to find you in my living room with a goat wearing a poncho who are you?? Why is the goat wearing a poncho?? How did you get the goat here I live on the 12th floor?? 186. “I was playing beer pong with a coin and accidentally threw it in your eye at a party” 187. “okay I get that you’re a good thief and you don’t want to go to jail but I’m the tired af detective sent to catch you I stg if you let me bring you in I can get you a good deal” 188. “We’ve been nothing but friends our whole lives but then we played seven minutes in heaven on a dare and now I think I’m in love with you” 189. “My guitarist quit the night before a gig that could be my bands big break and apparently, you are really good but if you screw this up for us I will hunt you down and slit your throat” 190. “it’s the middle of the night and I’m walking in the dark and there’s this guy following me and he’s gaining on me and I found a phone booth with a lock on and tried to call my sister but my hand was shaking so now I’ve ended up calling you and I don’t know who you are but please help” 191. They captured you and put you in a room with me because I can suppress other people’s powers so you hate me but I’m just lonely and bored and want to talk to you 192. Esteemed rival chefs who find each other shamelessly buying ramen at 3am 193. “I know it’s the apocalypse but please can we keep this stray dog” 194. We’re at a murder mystery party and I’m sure you’re the killer 195. Your grandma is forward even though we are just friends 196. “We got into a really heated Wii tennis match and the rec and now I wanna bang you” 197. “you are literally the last person I would expect to see at Disneyland but hey wanna ride space mountain” 198. “YOU LIKE GAME OF THRONES TOO?!” 199. “in interviewing you for a newspaper can you please stop flirting with me and we can get coffee afterwards” 200. “we’re enemies by day but league of legends allies by night” 201. Ancient gods 202. Whoops I accidentally summoned a demon 203. Co captains who always argue 204. “I didn’t mean to throw the water balloon at you I meant to hit my friend behind you” 205. There was a food fight and I accidentally threw spaghetti at the scariest kid in school 206. “I happened to glance in your window when you did some air guitar and then you caught me looking” 207. “I live a block away from the pizza place that’s open until 2 am and you’re like always here which is nice because I get to see you but, um is you sleeping here because you’re literally always here” 208. “I swear to god if I hear you taking a shower at 3 in the morning I will fight you, the pipes in this building are right above my room WHY are you taking a shower at THREE IN THE MORNING” 209. 210. “I can literally hear you sneezing through the walls and I bought you some chicken soup because I have exams to study for and your sneezing is seriously distracting” 211. “Im the poor loser you lent your umbrella to yesterday and my cat scratched through the fabric I’m sorry” 212. “we were partnered for this project and both forgot to do it and now have to pull an all nighter at my house” 213. “I came to this Halloween part as Frankenstein and you came as frankenstein’s wife and now everyone thinks we are dates” 214. We’re the only ones at this tiny bus shelter and you’ve been crying for the past ten minutes and id give you privacy but its pouring down with rain outside so “do you want to talk about it?” I guess 215. You’ve just moved into my apartment and I want a drink but you’ve been in the kitchen for an hour and you will judge me for drinking whiskey at noon on a Sunday 216. We’re both in the brass section of the marching band and you won’t stop making ‘horny’ puns 217. You work in construction and I walk by every day to give you a bagel 218. I sit behind you in lecture and bio1102 is not the place to watch porn 219. We were the only idiots who showed up to ballroom dance class without a partner 220. We are in class and you keep throwing paper balls at me why 221. Its 2am and I’m knocking on your window, wake up let’s go on a late-night walk or something idk can we hold hands already 222. Our kids got paired up for a project and I meant just drop my kid off at your house but now we are at the end of a three hour talk 223. Battle of the bands 224. Our grandparents are in the same nursing home and hate each other whereas we don’t. 225. Arrested at the same protest 226. How do you keep getting my name that wrong on my coffee cup? 227. Only two people who bought tickets to this movie 228. Our manager is making us push this crappy item no one needs but you thought my campaigns was funny so you bought it 229. I desperately need you to fix my laptop but please don’t judge me for my browser history 230. My kid’s hamster died while she was at school and I don’t know how to tell her 231. I made a dumb science joke in class and you’re the only one who laughed 232. Everyone in our dorm has gone out but I have the flu and hear you coughing pathetically from the next room wanna share my stash of cough drops and have Netflix marathon 233. Got into a seriously heated argument in the comments of a mutual friends post 234. Rival street performers 235. My kid shoplifted from your store and I marched her right back to apologies 236. Why didn’t you tell me this place was haunted before I rented it from you? 237. My band plays at the same restraint every Friday and you always make obscure requests and I know you’re trying to stump me but you have rally underestimated how much of a music geek I am 238. m the caterer and you’re the florist for this wedding and we bond over talking about how bad of a person the bride’s mother is 239. We’re chaperoning these kids at an ice skating rink and that last couples skate was pathetic how about we show them how it’s done? 240. We both work at rivalling gossip magazines and keep trying to outdo each other ridiculous stories 241. I accidentally caught the neighbor’s yard on fire and I didn’t think it could get worse but the volunteer fireman reprimanding me is gorgeous and probably thinks I’m an idiot 242. I didn’t mean to get you arrested I thought I was helping 243. Your pizza keeps getting delivered to my house and I need to talk to you about your choice of toppings 244. Graffiti artist/ mural painter 245. You’re the only major film critic who’s hated my movie and I need to talk to you about it because I agree

#supermega #sidemen #Hat Films #cow chop #crankgameplays #markiplier #tyler scheid #game grumps #cancer crew #iDubbbz #maxmoefoe #filthy frank

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thorntonkrell-blog-blog · 5 years ago

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Non-Fiction is the New Faction

Young Mary went on to celebrate another 91 Christmas birthdays. I was around for 67 of them as she was glad to see my father and her husband who saw my twinkle when he returned from the Phillipines at the end of WW2 which made me part of a significant demographic excess known as the Baby Boom. When my father was in the Phillipines and during his entire time in the service, my mother wrote him a letter every day.

I am an early Boomer and a late bloomer.

When she was child, she raised her brother and two sisters as her father died suddenly when she was in high school. She lived to be near the bedside of all of 'em when they passed. Same with my father, she comforted him till he died in her arms.

I was the oldest of her three children.

She loved me and supported us, every day of our lives.

I never bothered to ask her to thank me for choosing her above millions of candidates to be my mother while I was in my first infinity before my vacation before my next and final infinity.

And I know I'll see her again.

The stars twinkle

Mary's grandaughter is our youngest child.

Of course we named her Mary.

Yes, Mary Dear. Your twinkle brought your Mom and I together thirty years ago.

Thank you for that.

Yes, there's ANOTHER theory that this has already happened.

I have a theory that it happens over 300 millions times every day in the United States alone.

The initial discovery is called death and the something even more bizarre and wonderful is called birth. The vacation in between is called life or some say "lipstick land."

All of us on earth at this moment share a common state of inexplicability which we project as the "universe" or "reality". We create this reality as we go along living our lives in a state of mass hypnosis, love and wonder. Eventually we straighten things out, kick the bucket and re-awaken with only a vague memory of what we knew before.

This vague memory is called our subconscious.

With each awakening we discover a brand new universal puzzle to contemplate along with a brand new set of people also contemplating the same puzzle with slightly different kaleidoscopes. The most immediate, influential people we call our parents.

And you, dear Mary, call me Dad.

The tools that worked best the last time, even though we don't remember them, are called aptitudes.

When we discover them, we use them to explain the universe to ourselves and others particularly our children.

I get the feeling I've written this before.

I get the feeling this is what all writers are writing about all the time.

All singers singing about all the time etc.

I get the feeling you've read this before, Mary.

Of course it's all just a theory.

I am still alive, honey.

Aren't I ?

AVA’S SHOWER

When we moved to Tumbleweed, we had to enroll Mary in a brand new school. She was in third grade and had a broken leg. She arrived in time for school pictures. When the class pictures came out, I noticed this little girl with big glasses. Her name was Ava. I pointed her out to Mary and said "She looks like she'd be a good friend." Sure enough, they became besties and remain so to this day almost 30 years later.

This is the story of Ava's shower

I know this wasn't a dream because when I dream I always try to get the picture but the camera never works.

It was my bridal first shower. My gender had always rendered me ineligible but this shower was co-ed. We were enjoying our drinks and conversation downstairs when I noticed that the main female stars were missing.

Ava was trying on her wedding gown upstairs. I'm not sure who invited me but somehow through the grapevine I came too know that I would be welcome in this room and so would my camera.

This happens often in my dreams but in my dreams, the camera she don't work.

I walked up the stairs and entered the room. I was the only male but everyone seemed to welcome me.

Everyone was admiring Ava in her dress. Ava was radiating joy and reflecting the admiring glances that were coming her way. The dress was perfect. Everybody knew it.

I've been taking Ava's picture ever since she was a little girl. I wanted to get a great picture of Ava at this moment. All of my years of photography had led to this moment. It wasn't gonna come again.

Ava noticed me. She looked into the camera. I snapped. The camera worked.

This was no dream.

Mine wasn't the only camera in the room. Ava seemingly picked up on all of the lenses by not concentrating on any of them but rather enjoying her moment of celebration.

A model of decorum

I got my pictures. Everybody got their pictures. The cameras disappeared. I lingered with my lens.

At that moment, at that second, in about the time it takes a car to swerve a deadly swerve, Ava's expression changed. For an instant memory, vulnerability and pain flashed through her entire being in a collision of joy and pain.

I imagine she was thinking of her older sister who was not in the room. The older sister Abby who ended up on the deadly end of an unsignalled swerve on a dark Halloween night almost 10 years ago. A tragedy that changed everyone.

Suddenly Abby was in the room.

I didn't see Abby but I did see Ava seeing Abby as did my camera.

For one split second grief and recognition flashed across Ava's glowing face. In that split second I had to make the decision whether or not to snap the picture and "capture" this exceedingly private, candid, personal and vulnerable moment.

I was almost certain that the camera was going to malfunction revealing the entire scene as one more dream forever undocumented.

I snapped.

The camera worked.

Ava's expression returned to joy.

A few weeks later, I told Ava about the picture. I told her this story. I told her I wanted to write about it but couldn't do that unless she approved.

She said it would be an honor.

The wedding is this weekend.

This writing is in honor of Ava

and of Abby.

HEADING FOR FRONTIER AT LAST

Today's the day. Last night was the night. I only had to steal one mirror last night so I got my first half way decent shuteye in months.

At this moment I am resisting the urge to hit the sack and indulge in fatigue.

I'm thinking about the original Invasion of the Body Snatchers and Nightmare on Elm Street. In both of those flicks, sleep was to be avoided unless you wanted Freddy to slash through your walls or wake up as a pod, a poisoned pod.

Those movies always bothered me.

I hate the feeling of falling asleep when I don't want to fall asleep. This used to happen to me all the time, particularly on Wednesday nights when I was young.

Because I was big fan of horror films, my parents used to let me stay up "late" to watch Shock Theater which played all of the Lugosi, Karloff and Chaney films. Frankenstein, Dracula, the Wolfman, the Raven, the Mummy, the Black Cat, The Invisible Ray,The Ghoul,The Werewolf of London etc. The show came on came on past my bedtime so it was quite a privilege and quite a challenge.

Plus, I was actually scared by the movies or at least I expected to be.

I would take my position on the carpet in front of our timy teevee set. The movie would start and before too long, I would realize that I was falling asleep. I learned to recognize the feeling and the "oh no" that accompanied it. I would invariably choose to "rest my eyes" for just a minute during a commercial. I learned after awhile that once I started to rest my eyes, the rest periods would increase in frequency and duration until at last I was asleep on the floor and had to be carted of to bed all the time insisting "I'm awake, I'm awake"

The morning came and I awoke with a sense of failure and a determination to make it all the way through the next week. I realized that once I started to "rest my eyes", it was all over. I would make a conscious effort to "resist the rest" but week after week I failed.

I wasn't used to failure back in those days and it frightened me more than the movies did. I was learning about temptation and my inability to resist it.

This was my first previews of fatigue but I really didn't know what fatigue was until a few months ago. There's a difference between fatigue and being tired, passing out, blacking out, dozing off or being exhausted.

For the past few months, I've suffered fatigue and it's a lot different from "resting my eyes" because in fatigue I'm not even interested in the "movie" that is my life. All I want to do is sleep, well not exactly sleep but more like escape but evdn in the escaping there is the over-riding sense of failure and guilt as days melt away and merge with nights.

Fatigue sucks.

So as I write these words, I am resisting the urge to "rest my eyes" and to go downstairs to my cave/pit. The urtge is strong but not as strong as yesterday and yesterday wasn't as strong as the day before.

They told me after my last blast of radiation that sometimes the fatigue starts to go away after a week and a half but sometimes it can continue for three or four months or in some cases forever.

Today is exactly a week and a half since my last blast. I'm gonna go the distance. I'm not goin' downstairs. I'm not gonna turn into a pod person again today. No way. I've charged up my camera. I'm snapping flowers. I'll be leaving for the ballpark in three hours. I'm gonna look good. This is the day I marked down on my calendar for the beginning of my comeback and I'm not gonna rest my eyes until I get back from Frontier Field.

My brother is my best friend and I haven't seen him during this whole situation. I want to see him now. I want him to see me snapping pictures, keeping score, drinking a beer and rooting for the old home team.

Freddy Fatigue can't get me at Frontier Field if I keep my eyes on the ball.

THE OLD BALLGAME

One of my colleagues, a guy named Fred, got into as much trouble as I did for having classrooms that were not quiet.

Neither Fred nor I thought the criticism and penalization were justified but we did have "long hair" at the time and we were considered "popular" by the students.

Fred was a great teacher.

It was a far cry from the spray and pray method formerly preferred by the fearful badgers of the ruling realm and their supportive administrators.

Quiet in the classroom was no longer a guaranteed good thing.

Suddenly, Fred and I were seen as "innovators". People started imitating us and when they got good at it, they began to instruct us on how to do what we had been doing all along, since we had already moved on to the next thing which they were currently against but soon would be imitating and then instructing.

On and on and on and on etc.

Meanwhile, my classes were getting busier and buzzyer so I was headed for trouble. Quiet is so much quieter when it's surrounded by buzz.

One day Fred and I and about fifty teachers were at a workshop run by a consultant who hadn't taught a public school class in years but who was paid more than we were to look at our watches and tell us what time it was. The consultant was also on the lookout for new ideas which he could steal and profit from when he took his carnival on the road., always searching for a new parade to jump in front of and declare himself the leader etc.

So the consultant called on teachers to "share" new ideas that they had. Most of the "sharing" consisted of ideas that people like Fred and I had been criticized for by the same people who were now "experts" at whatever "technique" they were sharing.

The consultant ooohed and aaahed over every "insight" no matter how unremarkable.

Meanwhile, Fred was in the back of the room trying to stay serious.

Fred was a big, dark haired dark eyed handsome guy who wasn't lacking in self confidence and didn't need or want to be drawn into this festival of self congratulation.

Even though Fred hadn't raised his hand to volunteer a response, the consultant decided to call on him.

"Do you have a technique, Fred, that you'd like to share?", the consultant asked in an overly friendly way.

Fred said "Well, I guess I could share what I call 'the old ball game'.

The consultant perked up. "I've never heard of that technique, Fred. It sounds very interesting. How does it work?"

Possibly a new parade was forming.

"Well" said Fred, "if I see a kid's not paying attention, I throw a tennis ball at him/her. That usually gets their attention."

Fred was serious.

I looked at Fred's face. Fred was looking at the consultant's face. The consultant had no idea what to say.

Nobody ooohed or aaahed.

I burst out laughing which broke the silence.(I had used the same "technique" myself" on quite a few occasions except I didn't use a tennis ball. I used a bunch of tinfoil that I had rolled up in a ball for my version of "the old ball game". I called my tin foil ball "the egg of unexpected courage". The kids called it THE EGG.)

Back to the seminar......

Fred started laughing.

The consultant sorta smiled

Once again, Fred and I were operating on the same page even though we weren't aware that we were until Fred answered the consultant. I had no idea that Fred also used "the old ball game".

This is one of my fondest moments because "the old ball game be it tennis or tinfoil" actually worked and probably still does today

I am afraid, however, that a few months after this moment.....some consultant somewhere was instructing teachers on the effective use of what has become known as "the old ball game".

Beautiful.

ADVERB ANGST

Call me Very.

I'm an adverb. I'm angry about that. I'm common. I'm used and abused all the time. I don't even get the complimentary "ly" that some of my mates get. My ancestors had it for awhile when people knew how to talk. Remember "verily" or "yea verily".

Those days are gone.

Now, I have to submit to those fancy pants "ly" adverbs e.g. "very quickly".

"Quickly" at least gets to modify a verb, an action word of some kind, maybe even a passionate action like "kissed". Then I arrive. I diminish the kiss by making it even less soul driven, less selfless, less sensual, more furtive, dismissive and distracted.

See, I hate situations like that. I'm jealous of "quickly" who's nothing but a verblicking sycophant passing himself off as an expression of time.

It's a bit more tolerable when I submit to an adjective. At least an adjective bows to a person, place, idea or thing; tangible, usually visible, often alive, occasionally intelligent almost always miraculous.

Action verbs are my cup of tea but let's face it action verbs ain't exactly nouns. Action verbs need nouns to give them meaning. Nouns don't need action verbs they can exist quite well lthank you on verbs of being. After all, what is a human but "being".

Even when modifying an action verb I usually need an "ly" to make any sense

I am uncomfortable modifying verbs of being. "very are" won't cut it. Neither will "very is", "very was" nor wishes neither not v"very could" or "very would".

Speaking of the subjunctive, I wish i was more existential. Hell I'm barely essential. I'm actually an add on although ever since teehee came along and people forgot how to talk, a lot more "very" are in use today.

I'm designated Very Mask Neg Neutral which means I am the very that can be only used to describe Masculine Negative to Neutral Adjectives, verbs or other adverbs such as

cumbersome lethargic immature uncommunicative incompetent self-absorbed smarmy frantically and sloppy Making them each a little worse.

My girlfriend is also an add on. She's a Very designated Fem Neg Neutral. She gets to work with feminine negative to neutral adjectives, verbs such as

bitchy bloated perfunctory over-sensitive Superficial Moody Slutty Vengeful and air headed.

The classes above us are Very Mask Positive And Fem Positive. They work with

courageous dedicated authentic Athletic Intelligent Capable gorgeous resplendent intuitive sensual supportive nurturing and erotic

Do you see why I'm upset? Very upset.

They'll terminate us low class adverbs when and if we stop being over used. When and if people stop watching teevee and texting. When and if people start articulating and valuing vocabulary rather than gloss.

In other words, we'll be around a long time.

A very long time.

Some of the higher class verbs were even used as adjectives for a bright, shining, glossy time as in "She is soooo very"

I once had to modify a very Pompous adjective, negative implication of course as in "He's very, VERY"

Thank God that particular trend, that monstrosity has retreated for awhile.

My woman, Very Fem Neg Neutral has a real bad attitude. She gets it from her job. Look what she works with bitchy, bloated, hyper-critical etc. Still between my anger and her attitude we still managed to get busy and have babies. Our babies are the "kindas". They're even more inarticulate than my woman and me.

I'm kinda afraid. Kindas are the adverbs of the future.

I am very kinda afraid.

CROSSWORDS

Way back in another lifetime, when I was teaching kids how to write, my class used to do the New York Times crossword puzzle together every other Monday. The puzzle gets more cryptic, arcane and oblique as the week continues. Monday is fair game for high schoolers working in tandem. Tuesday's puzzle maybe. Saturday's forget about it. Maybe that's why we don't have school on Saturdays except for Breakfast Clubbers who are puzzled and puzzling enough with or without crosswords.

I always told my writing students that writers need to know something about everything and then need the vocabulary to articulate what they know by choosing the exact right word for the right place. Close is good but no cigar. Crossword puzzles serve as an exercise not only in vocabulary and exactitude but also in breadth of knowledge.

Crossword puzzles are to writers what shadow boxing is to boxers or what ping pong is to tennis players or driving ranges to golfers, a truncated version of a more pervasive obsession. Aside from their value as literary barbells, crosswords teach one of life's most valuable lessons. If you have one wrong word or a right word in the wrong place, it screws up the rest of the puzzle. We can't insist that a word is right if it is wrong. Will power only extends so far. It can't be right simply because we want it to be right and we're good people. That's called willfullness. In the words of Johnny C, "if it don't fit, you must acquit". Somewhere in all puzzles, before we abandon original thinking or stick with our misconceptions, we confront wavering allegiance to a shady word choice. Since most of our lives are spent re-inforcing our own biases, wavering allegiance is a frightening flourish of vulnerability. In America, especially in politics, it's all about being "right" first and then sticking with that righteousness in the face of hell or high water, fire and fury.

Wavering allegiance is a forerunner to change. All change includes loss and all loss requires mourning. Who wants to mourn? Who wants to admit a mistake? In politics, to flip is to flop.

So when we stick with wrong words in Crosswords, we never solve the puzzle or the problem contained within the puzzle, a problem that grows more pressing with every passing day. Usually national problems come in the form of dollars and cents, bread and butter, black and white , war and peace, red and blue.

Hey if we come to a cross roads where we should turn right and instead turn left, don't worry if we drive completely around the world we'll end up going the right, right way.

Once upon a time on my way to Iowa from South Dakota, I made a wrong turn and drove halfway through Minnesota.

With a crossword puzzle, we can just take out an eraser. With a war, with poverty, with racism, with recession, with division we need something more than rubber at the forgiveness end of a pointed stick of lead. Every day seems like a Saturday crossword.

ALI, FRAZIER, CHUVALO AND EVELYN

Slides.

Remember slides?

You'd throw your slides into a Kodak Carousel and voila...a slide show up against the wall.

Needless to say I threw quite a few slides against quite a few walls over the years as I told my Ali stories.

I liked one of the slides in particular.

I made a nice 11 by 14 print from that negative.

Ali and Joe exchanging punches during their second fight at Madison Square Garden.

We all got older as the years passed. It seemed like Ali and Joe got older faster than everybody else. What else could we have expected?

During this time of great decline, George Chuvalo added to the pugilistic tragedy.

George Chuvalo

The Croatian Crusader.

The Heavyweight Champion of Canada.

The human punching bag and common opponent for the vastly more talented Ali and Frazier.

The man who could not be knocked down.

The man whose face had launched a thousand fists.

George Chuvalo had a face that had been sculpted by other fists into the face of a fist.

And then after George retired, life stepped in and continued the battering.

He lost his wife and sons to suicide. Heroin was very involved.

Still George refused to hit the canvas.

Word got through to his old opponents, Ali and Joe, that George was hurt and staggering but that he refused to go down.

A boxing organization in Rochester decided to throw a benefit dinner for George. Yeah it was a band aid on a shotgun wound but every little bit helps.

Joe Frazier decided to attend and waive any fee.

So did another wounded warrior name of Muhammad Ali.

Ali was shaking from Parkinsons and Joe could barely see.

Joe and Ali didn't usually appear together.

Bad blood existed.

People wondered why after all these years bad blood still existed between Ali and Frazier.

The answer is simple. These guys tried to kill each other three times in front of the whole world and they damned near succeeded.

He jest at scars who's never felt a wound.

There was a lot of laughter that night but nobody was laughing at the scars.

I was there too.

The Chuvalo benefit cost a hundred bucks to attend. My ringside seat at Ali-Frazier fight also cost $100.

So much had changed.

One thing hadn't changed.

The 11 by 14 photograph that I took at Ali Frazier 2 looked exactly the same. The two of them stalking each other in the middle of the ring, youg and heallthy and with all the lights shining on them.

I brought the picture to the benefit.

I had met Muhammad, Joe and George individually but I never thought that I'd see all three of them in the same room at the same time.

Yet, here we were for the common good of Chuvalo

In the lobby, I got a chance to visit with boxing expert Burt Sugar and HBO analyst Larry Merchant. They both reacted to me as if I had pissed myself while wearing a white suit.. Arrogant and a million miles away from Ali in terms of engagement and humility, these two vampires brushed off my questions about the sweet science with an insolence worth mentioning here.

Vampires

I left those "famous guys".

I was relieved to leave.

I entered the main room. I found my table. My name was still not Sinatra nor for that matter Sugar or Merchant so my $100 dollar table resembled my "ringside" seat in terms of physical distance from the action.

And I wasn't even at the same table as the Son of Sanford.

I shared a "way in the back" table with another human who also had connection/complexion problems; a stunning middle aged African American woman named Evelyn. We had the only two seat table in the place. Evelyn and I chatted for awhile about the value of our $100 as compared to the $100 spent by the more connected, very Caucasian, very male attendees flaunting upfront and uptight.

We figured we were outsiders. We bonded.

I showed her my 11 by 14 photo. She liked it and said "be careful with that. It's valuable".

Evelyn had a mission of her own.

Evelyn told me that she knew Joe Frazier and the last time Joe was in town, she really got to know him and he got to know her. She planned on having a little chat with Joe later in the evening about his previous method of leaving town. She assured me that Joe would be paying attention.

All the stars were already seated miles away at the main table. All the stars that is except for Ali.

It's only fitting that the champ enters last.

All of the other guys had entered from the front of the venue.

When Ali and his entourage entered the room, they came in from the back. As soon as he entered the room, the whole environment changed for the better. He walked very, very slowly. Since he came in from the back, the first table he passed was the distant table for two. He stopped at our table. He looked right at me and although it seemed impossible, I got the distinct feeling that he remembered me from our morning at Deer Lake decades before.

Evelyn noticed the look and asked me after Ali had passed us, "does he know you".

I told Evelyn that I had spent some time with him a long time ago.

Whether he recognized me or not, he once again gave me that wonderful feeling that I was cool with him and that our table was the best table in the house.

and that, once again, made me feel cool with myself

He couldn't possibly have remembered.

I guess that's what charisma is all about.

Like I said, I had met Sugar and Merchant, ten minutes before they took their upfront seats. I'm sure they had already forgotten about me and their vibe would have amplified that disregard.

Not with Ali.

I started feeling great.

Important

The whole room turned back to see the old champ. I got the feeling that everybody in the room started feeling great for different reasons.

Uplifiting

Transcendent

Eliciting smiles and cheers with every step, the Champ caned his way to the front. Everybody in the place was experiencing rampant, contact joy.

I don't think that Frazier was feeling that joy although he probably remembered feeling a lot of contact. It was obvious that Joe was feeling pretty dang great before he even entered the place, if ya know what I mean.

Obviously, a lot of feelings fly around a room when Ali enters that room and walks toward a partying Joe Frazier.

The dinner began.

Neither Ali nor Frazier addressed the audience; for different reasons.

Chuvalo expressed his gratitude towards both men for showing up and making his benefit such a success. Weirdly enough if a three man boxing match broke out, Chuvalo would probaly win even though both Joe and Ali had batterred him in the past.

I assume Merchant and Sugar blabbed some and sucked a bit of energy from the room although their wisdom has slipped beneath the radar screen of both my memory and contempt.

When the program concluded, the master of ceremonies, a born bullshitter named Jerry Flynn announced that for a half an hour the head table participants would be willing to sign autographs.

Immediately the rush to the front began led by the people sitting in the front.

From the way back table, we watched the crowd in front gain full advantage.

We only had a half hour and it looked as if there were two hours of people in front of us.

We did a little spontaneous human calculus.

Evelyn headed towards Joe.

She had more than an autograph in mind.

She had a piece of her mind in mind and she was about to give that to Joe.

I headed for Ali, by far the longer of the two lines.

Somehow, my 11 by 14 print caught the eye of somone in Ali's entourage. He asked me to identify the picture.

"Ringside, Madison Square Garden, Ali-Frazier II"

"Diju take dat picture?"

"Yes I did"

"Champ prolly like to see it. C'mon"

He escorted me towards the front of the line, not the very front but a definite improvement on my table rank. Ali and I were in the same force field. I knew he'd have time for me even as the minutes ticked away. With about 10 minutes left in the opportunity, our chance came. I put my picture in front of the Champ. He considered it carefully. He was in no rush whatsoever. Then the familiar whisper that he either said or sent. I'll never know which but the message was clear..."choo take this?"

"Yeah Champ I did'

Another whisper/send "it's good"

Then the eye contact. Ali and me eyeball to eyeball again. Same eyeballs that had been eyeball to eyeball with Martin King, John Lennon, Sonny Liston, Elvis Presley, Nelson Mandella, Joe Louis, James Brown, Stallone, Duvall, Carson, Borgnine, Malcolm X, Ross, Chamberlain and infinite others were inviting me to come on in and stay a minute.

Make yourself comfortable

Join the crowd.

Maybe u been here before

He gave me his beautiful Parkinson's signature. Very slow, very painful, looking up every few seconds directly in my eyes as if this were the first signature of his career given to his best friend. Ali had signed another piece for me at Deer Lake decades before. Like the man himself, Ali's signature had changed dramatically over the years. His Parkinson's signature took a good twenty seconds to make with five separate lookups and included only the fragments of four letters..... M...a...l....i. Ironically he made his mark over Joe Frazier's image in the ring in my picture.

He hit me with the feint again although this feint was very faint yet still overwhelming.

I thanked the champ. Again the eyes. Again the illusion of recognition. Again the electricity.

So long champ.

Still five minutes of the half hour remained.

Wow

Pause

Shift

Recalculate

I got a shot at Joe.

Where's Evelyn.

There she be.

Evelyn chillin' with Joe

"Hey Evelyn" from fity feet away with four minutes left.

"Hey Ice, c'mon up here and meet Joe."

Once again the Red Sea miraculoulsy parted.

The Red Sea thought Evelyn was Joe's wife and I was a friend of Joe's family.

I got to the table with time to spare.

Evelyn said "Joe, this is my friend. Sign his picture"

I put my picture in front of Joe.

Joe looked at my picture.

"dijoo take this picture" "Yeah I did, Champ"

"good picture"

Ironically, Joe signed over the image of Ali in the ring in the light at Madison Square Garden, young and beautiful.

Floating

Getting ready to sting forever.

Evelyn gave Joe a peck on the cheek.

Joe took a sip from his beer.

I gave Evelyn a peck on her cheek.

It was the last time that I ever saw any of them.

Time was up. Ring the bell.

FAMOUS MIKE CAN DRAW

Some stories are so lovely that I hesitate to write them. Some legends are so fragile and delicate that I'm reluctant to reveal them. Here's a lovely story and a delicate legend all in one.

I'll try to do them justice before the memories fade completely as the blur increases every day.

I remember his first day in class. He was fresh off the boat. I mean that literally. He was a boat person from Viet Nam. He was in my English class.

He didn't speak a word of English.

I didn't know what to do with him that first day so I somehow signalled/sent him to the main office to pick up an attendance sheet.

The secretary at the main office was expecting a student from another class named Mike. When my student arrived, whatever his name was, it wasn't Mike. Helen asked my new student if his name was Mike. He didn't know what Helen was saying but he knew a question when he heard one.

He nodded his head up and down.

Helen said "Here, Mike", and gave him the papers.

He returned to my classroom a few minutes later without the attendance sheet but with whatever administrivia Helen was supposed to give to "Mike". I took the paper from him. I said thanks and asked him what his name was. He said "Mike"

I said "Hi, Mike"

That's how Mike got his name.

Aside from the single word "Mike", Mike spoke no English. We were a pair, Mike and I.

Mike would come into class, take his seat and listen with great patience and attention to the academic tumult engulfing him. I knew something of the concept of linguistic immersion wherein a person learns a foreign language more quickly by surrounding himself with it. I believed this was happening with Mike although I didn't know for certain. I did know that in this case English was the "foreign" language to Mike and he was surrounded.

One day after a couple of weeks, I noticed that Mike was taking "notes" of what I was saying. I couldn't imagine what Mike's notes looked like so I casually made my way to his desk to sneak a peek. Mike's "note" was a surreal and photographic drawing of a rose. As I looked at the rose, I was amazed as much by its sensitivity of rendering as I was by its virtousity.

Near the drawing, I wrote the word "rose."

Then I said the word "rose"

I spelled the word "R..O..S..E"

Mike smiled and said "rose"

I took a risk. I had a feeling the risk would be approved by Mike.

I announced to the class. "Check this out, everybody. Mike can draw."

Everybody crowded around Mike's desk.

Everybody look at the rose.

Everybody flipped out.

Everybody started saying "Mike can draw"

Eventually Mike got the message.

He spoke his first English sentence in English class.

This is what he said.

"Mike can draw"

He smiled.

Time stood still.

I'm here to tell you, Mike could draw.

Many scholars praise the efficient linguistic style of Julius Caesar, how much he could say with how few words. All of France is divided into three parts. Has anyone ever said more with fewer words at the beginning of his story.

This is the beginning of Mike's story.

Mike Can Draw.

Mike not only continued to draw but he also continued to listen with purpose and intention. Mike observed not only with his eyes but also with his heart and mind. Mike's vocabulary began to grow as he listened and observed. Nouns first then verbs then adjectives.

Here's the story of the first adjective I can remember.

One day, I walked over to Mike's desk and noticed that he had been sketching a portrait of himself.

On his portrait, I wrote a bunch of nouns with arrows like "mike" and "nose" and "eyes" and "ears"and "head" and "neck" and "body".

I pointed to each word and said it. Mike repeated the word with me.

Then I added the adjective.

I wrote "famous"; drew an arrow to the picture of Mike and said the word.

Mike hesitated a second and then asked "Mike famous?"

I said "Yes, Mike is famous"

Mike startled me with his reply.

"No, Mike not famous. You, Mr. Rivers...you famous."

I realized that Mike's language skills were blossoming with as much beauty as his drawing skills.

From that day on, every time I saw Mike I would always say.

"Here's the famous Mike."

And Mike would always say, "Mike not famous. Mr. Rivers famous."

We would laugh.

We were connected.

Sure enough, Mike WAS becoming famous, at least in my class. I was running the school newspaper at the time. I asked Mike, still using arrows, objects and printed words if he would draw a comic strip for the paper. He drew the strip. The school read Mike's comic. His character was a lion, The school loved it. Mike's fame grew. His audience expanded.

By this time, everybody in my class knew something rare was happening with Mike and his art, kids were always crowding around his desk to see what new drawings were coming alive.

About this time, Mike develped a crush on Kathy.

I discovered this when Mike showed me a picture of Kathy that he had been drawing.

Mike was stylizing Kathy rather than photographing her with his rendering. I immediately recognized Kathy even with her stylized, over sized Disney girl eyes. I wrote "Kathy" on Mike's paper and drew an arrow. Mike blushed and smiled.

I could tell Mike wanted another word from me, an adjective perhaps so under Kathy, I wrote "beautiful" and drew another arrow.

Mike put the drawing away. His portrait of Kathy was not an image that he intended to show to the class. Not only were we connected; we had a secret.

A couple of weeks passed and Mike's language skills kept growing.

One day, he took out the picture of Kathy and showed me something new that he had added. He showed me that he knew how to change and adjective into a noun.

Under my printing of "beautiful", Mike had printed a word of his own.

This is the word that Mike had printed in painstaking calligraphy.

Beauty

Beauty is truth and truth is beautiful.

I was facing a beautiful truth in my professional life as well as a crossroads. I was given the opportunity to write a grant under the auspices of the Federal Career Education Incentive Act Grant Program, the purpose of which, as the name suggests, was to help secondary education become a better link to careers.

I proposed my very first grant.

The proposal was funded for $500,000.

In my proposal I visualized the creation of an intern program. The idea was radical at the time. I was chosen to be the administrator for the project. I would have to leave the classroom.

Leaving the classroom was the crossroads and a difficult factor in the decision.

When the kids heard what I had done. They were proud of me. Mike came to me and said "Mike not famous, Mr. Rivers famous."

I left the classroom.

I left Mike in the capable hands of the Art. Dept.

The day that I left, Mike showed me his private sketchbook.

In his sketchbook were dozens of drawing of Kathy.

Underneath each sketch; a single printed word:

Beauty.

By the time I got the Intern Program running smoothly, moving it from dream to imagination to realization, Mike was back in my life.

Mike had made breathtaking progress in language and art and had begun to crystallize his dreams. Mike had grown to love classic Walt Disney cartoons and wanted to become an animator.

I had heard that fantasy from other students before and I would hear it again but with Mike...well he had a dream, spectacular discipline and dedication. I had an intern program.

Uh, let's put two and two together and see if it comes out four, twenty two or five.

He had even learned to play the guitar well enough to supply his own music to the animation. In Mike's cartoon one of the characters was a lion. Mike asked me, because I was "famous" to provide the voice for the lion.

Mike's cartoon was eventally selected in an extremely competitive national cartoon contest to be shown on Nickelodeon.

Mike's cartoon was one of the best student cartoons in the country. Little ol' famous lion voice me was roaring on television sets across America.

Mike was only a sophomore in high school but he was already thinking about college and colleges were thinking about him.

Anything was possible including truth , beauty and fame.

Mike was most interested in beauty.

He had discovered that the Disney studios regularly hired interns from the California Institute of the Arts. Mike knew about internships. He had completed four of them in high school.

In the meantime Mike had taken all the art courses at the school plus four more at Rochester Institute of Technology and had aced them all.

Mike spoke a lovely version of the English language, the direct, clear, soft and kind versionrarely used by native speakers.

Mike could draw

Mike could talk

Mike could write, words and music.

Mike could play the guitar.

Mike had a resume full of A's, internships, art work, awards and a cartoon that had played nationally on Nickelodeon. Mike applied to the California Institute of the Arts. We were all happy but not surprised when Mike was accepted and scholarshipped.

Mike was ready for another journey.

I was on a bit of a journey myself. My first marriage was breaking up although I didn't realize it or perhaps was denying the realization.

Mike had never been to a rock concert in his life so at the end of the school year, the night after his graduation I invited Mike as our family guest to see the Moody Blues at the Canandaigua Performing Arts Center. Mike acceptd the invitatiion.

You'll hear more about THAT later.

After the concert, Mike left for California. I haven't seen him since.

Here's the last few things I heard about Mike.

In college, his skill and interest continued to blossom. As an undergraduate, he applied for and completed an internship at Disney Studios.

Upon graduation from college, Mike was hired as an animator by Disney. His first screen credit appeared at the end of the LIttle Mermaid, listing Mike as an animator of Ariel. Apparently Disney liked Mike because his next assignment was a substantial promotion. Mike would be one of the main designers for Beauty and the Beast

Mike was helping to create Belle.

By now, everybody knows WHAT Belle looks like. Only a few of us know WHO Belle looks like. Beauty, if you will, looks exactly like the sketches of Kathy that Mike labored over so mightily, so beautifully, so passionately, so innocently and so truthfully during his junior high days.

Kathy is Belle.

Kathy is

Beauty.

Some stories are so lovely that I hesitate to write them. Some legends are so fragile and delicate that I am afraid to relate or reveal them.

Remember?

Well, I tried.

As I tried, I kept flashing back to the writers who brought us the legends of the Old west, those scribes who turned big nosed, shiftless, violent, alcoholic William Hickock into the great Wild Bill, the handsome hero who died, shot in the back while playing poker and holding the deadman's hand...a pair of aces and a pair of eights. .

A cardinal rule for those writers was, according to John Ford in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, "if you come to a crossroads between truth and legend, write the legend."

The legend of Mike and Kathy is the loveliest local legend, I've ever personally encountered. I'm part of it; a small part but yes I was there in the very beginning.

I can vouch for everything until Mike left for California. I can vouch for the similarities between Mike's sketches of Kathy and the rendering of Beauty.

Every once in awhile, when I reminisce about my teaching days, I like to think that I was the guy who had something to do with the inspiration for the creation of Beauty.

And ya know what?

It's a beautiful feeling

Maybe even true.

Next time somebody you know mentions truth, beauty or Beauty and the Beast tell 'em this story.

That's how legends grow.

AFTERNOON ANGEL

I know for sure it was a Tuesday afternoon. I don't know if it was the first time I smoked weed, such moments are hard to pinpoint. Today is also a Tuesday afternoon. Today I found out that Ray Thomas, the flautist for the Moody Blues has passed away from prostate cancer. I know something about cancer.

The beauty of metaphysiction is its ability to go flash forward and backward at the same time while flirtting with the eternal and the imaginary.

The Tuesday afternoon that begins this story happened fifty years ago. I was shooting footage for a film that I was making in graduate school. My idea was to simply walk around and shoot whatever came into my lens on this Tuesday afternoon and call whatever came out "Tuesday Afternoon" It was during this activity that I might or might not have smoked a joint because I know the guy with me was a "weirdo" at the time who definitely smoked the rope. I had shot enough weird footage so I was confident that within the images, I could find 10 solid minutes that would represent what a Tuesday afternoon looked and sounded like and that it would probably be interesting to watch in say 50 years so that I could clearly remember what fifty years ago looked and sounded like.

Yeah, maybe I was loaded as I recall this thought process.

We were driving back to campus. We turned on an FM station. By this time I was an album guy and FM was the album station. I was trying to figure out what music I would use in the background of the film when on the radio came "Tuesday Afternoon". I had never heard anything like it before. When the song was over, the announcer said "that was Tuesday Afternoon by the Moody Blues from their new album Days of Future Passed"

I knew the Moody Blues. I knew of their hit "Go Now" which I wasn't crazy about. I didn't know that the personnel of the band had changed and they had gone from THAT to THIS. Ray Thomas was in both versions, I learned later.

Shocked, stoned and stunned by synchronicity, I became a Moody Blues fan. In other words, I too was a weirdo. At the time you had to be a little weird to like the Blues. They were hanging with LSD guru Timothy Leary and proud of it.

I couldn't believe that "drug music" could be so beautiful or that a simple Tuesday afternoon could be so profound.

I had the music for my film.

I found my film in the music.

Now let's fast forward 15 years.

My first marriage was breaking up although I didn't realize it or perhaps was denying the realization. I know I felt like I had a ton of bricks on my back.

The "famous" Mike had never been to a concert before and he loved the Moody Blues. I invited Mike and a couple of friends to join my family at the Moody Blues concert at the Canandaigua Performing Arts Center.

Mike accepted my invitation.

The night of the Moody Blues arrived.

I had purchased a dozen tickets for the show.

The day of the night of the Blues was very hot. I ran ten miles that afternoon trying to lighten my load.

My brother, my sister, my wife, a few of our friends, my son Beau, Mike and I made the short trip. We walked to the gates. I took out the tickets. I only had eleven tickets. Everybody was looking at me. I counted the tickets only eleven again. I was going to have to exclude someone from the concert. I looked around at the faces. I knew I would exclude myself. I looked at the tickets again. I counted the tickets. I looked at Mike. My marriage was falling apart. Mike was on his way to California. I had screwed up the tickets. I had ruined Mike's first concert. I could feel the earth spinning. I said something incoherent to my brother. He looked at me with concern and said "whaaa?" I spoke again and once again sounded like Gregor Samsa after his metamorphosis. I started to stumble. The tickets fell out of my grasp. I looked directly into my son's eyes as the weight on my shoulders flew off and I fell in slow motion towards the ground. As I looked into his eyes, I realized that I was watching a son watch the death of his father. I wondered how this would affect him him. I heard my wife scream "he didn't go to his physical"

I hit the ground

I knew I was dead.

When I opened my eyes some time later to see what heaven was like I saw two faces. One face was of a beautiful, elderly woman. The other was Mike. This was Mike's first minute at his first concert.

In the background Moody Blues music was playing.

The elderly woman whispered her phone number in my ear. It went right into my permanent memory She told me to call anytime and that the more I called, the more I would want to call. Eventually I wouldn't even need a phone.

I still remember the number. I call it everyday.

The number is/was a prayer.

I called it before I started writing this, seeking help to get this right.

Phone? I don't need no stinken phone.

They wanted to call an ambulance.

I didn't want that

I wanted to go where the music was, where the angel was.

Somebody picked up the tickets and found all twelve.

We went inside the Shell and heard the Blues.

The woman had disappeared once it became clear that I was going to live.

The last time I saw her, she was listening to the show. The Blues may or may not have been playing Tuesday afternoon when our eyes met.

Flash forward

Today, Tuesday, I learned that Ray Thomas had died. Ray was 76 years old. I'm 71. How could all of those future days have passed.

I'm calling the number.

IN THE PACKAGE

Mr. Baseball remained in his coma for months.

It was the bottom of the ninth and his team was behind by 100 runs and there were two out and two strikes on Mr. Baseball. One more strike and he was out.

Game over.

That was the situation the last time that I visited him at the Community hospital.

Time passed. Mr. Baseball kept fouling off pitches, his faithful loving wife Rosie by his side.

Rosie figured that maybe things would improve if they moved Baseball to his home ball park. Still in his coma, Mr. Baseball was transported to his home.

Home plate.

His home plate was far away from my homeplate.

We didn't visit in person, overwhelmed as were with our own ballgame.

When he got home, minus a few tubes and some drugs that hadn't worked, Mr Baseball out of nowhere, hit a homerun. He came out of the coma but remained bedridden.

We didn't know about the rally, we had left the game a little early.

We knew that he was home and we had his phone number. One day, Lynn called the number and Rosie answered.

The rally was still going on. Therapists were pitching now and Mr. Baseball continued to swing away always encouraged by Rosie who was as encouraged as she was encouraging. She told Lynn that a speech therapist was pitching at the moment. She whispered to Mr. Baseball that Lynn was on the phone. He understood; another base hit. Rosie put the phone up to Mr. Baseball's face. Lynn said "Hello, Mr. Baseball."

Lynn's 'hello' was like a hanging curve ball. Mr. Baseball took a mighty swing and said in a slow, soft, labored voice "Hi Lynn."

Home run. Grand slam.

Rosie took the phone back and explained the progress Baseball had been making.

He was scoring on the coma. His therapists were amazed.

He scored 200 runs and beat the stroke.

Meanwhile he had developed cancer.

It was the cancer, not the coma that finally got him.

We went to the funeral. Mr. Baseball looked good almost as good as he looked the time he caught a foul ball barehanded at Frontier Field. In my dreams, he shows up at his funeral and he, Rosie, Lynn and I go off to dinner as if nuthin' had happened. He even makes fun of me for imagining that everything wasn't perfect.

We paid our condolences to Rosie.

A week later, we got a package in the mail with Mr. Baseball's address as the return.

In the package was the fiber optic bear.

DEAD, ALIVE or DREAMING

We thought we had located heaven but we had to pass through Indiana first. I was wondering why the hell somebody decided to name this state Indiana when we cruised into a blind spot.

The first moment that I realized we were in a blind spot was when I saw the front fender of a semi smashing through the driver’s side window. We were going 70, I don't know how fast the semi was going but somehow the driver never saw us when he attempted to change lanes.

I remember flying up in my seat and hitting my head against the roof of our vehicle.

Then the swerves began as the semi hit the brake while it pushed us down the road. For a moment we were perpendicular with the eightyeen wheeler and taking up both lanes. I remember thinking to myself….I can’t die here. I’ve got to teach next week. Nobody will know who the hell we are….our friends back home will never understand how we came to crash and burn in this weird place.

This can’t be the end but it must be. Nobody ever lives to tell this story.

We disengaged from the semi and the high speed spin began.

The laws of physics must be obeyed.

The swerve into spin continued forever. I lost consciousness. When I came to a second or a minute, an hour or a lifetime later, our totaled van was in the median between the lanes of a four lane highway.

I figured that I had just learned how to die. It was simple really. You hit your head and the video tape called life goes dark for an undetermined time and when you wake up, you’re in a median in Indiana.

Slowly, I got the impression that I might be alive but what about Lynn? She.was driving She must be dead. I saw the fender smash through her window. I saw the flying glass Her head was against the steering wheel.

There was blood.

She had to be dead.

The whole goddamned thing was my fault.

I was the one who thought we could find heaven.

Whatever this was; it didn’t look like heaven. I had a lot to learn about heaven. I had a camera. Soon I would use it. In my dreams, the camera never works. The camera worked. Whatever this was, it wasn't a dream.

to my mortal amazement, Lynn was as alive as I.

To my immortal wonder, perhaps she was as dead as I.

I saw the truck coming through her window.

No way that she could have survived that collision as long as there were laws of physics that governed force, mass, speed and velocity.

If she was alive…these natural laws had been circumvented which put us in the realm of the supernatural where we have remained ever since.

And the blood?

We both had slashes above our right elbow from the shattered glass….nothing serious.

We were able to exit the vehicle without much trouble.

I went to check on my cameras. In my dreams, my camera is always broken at times like this.

My camera was shattered.

That suggested, I might wake up so I decided to go with the dream a little further to see what would happen.

I went to my video camera. It seemed to be working.

Uh Oh.

This might not be a dream.

Whatever it was, if I could tape it…it might help.

I turned on the camera. It worked. The semi had come to a stop about 150 yards in front of us. The driver was still in the cab

I pointed the camera in the other direction and noticed a person coming towards us.

I kept the camera aimed at his face so I got a closer up look than I would have without the camera.

I focused on his eyes.

His eyes told me that he thought he was looking at a couple of ghosts.

When he got within speaking distance, I put down the camera.

“I saw the whole thing. I thought you guys were goners? Are you okay?”

I wasn’t sure.

We walked around to the side of the van. Lynn was leaning up against it.

I kept the video running.

The tape would later be seen at least three times on national teevee.

Moments later, the police arrived.

Lynn explained the collision with astounding calm and clarity.

I was no longer taping.

They arranged for our totaled van to be removed from the median.

They gave us a ride to a nearby hotel.

They explained our situation to the folks at the front desk who set us up with a room although all of our belongings were still in the van.They gave us a room pro-bono. Everybody told us not to worry.

We found out that we were in La Grange, Indiana.

All we had was the clothes on our backs.

And the aid of better angels.

I was teaching summer school.

I was a teacher all the way. I taught twelve months a year. No house painting for me.

I had been going twelve months a year for ten years with only one break in between. I didn't teach in the summer of 87, the year that I met Lynn.

Lynn was a single Mom when we met. She was raising three daughters. I was a single Dad raising a son and a daughter. Her kids liked me and my kids liked her. We spent a lot of time together especially on the weekends when I had custody of my two.

Lynnn was working part time at First Federal Bank.

She was good with change. She balanced every day. She could find the errors when someone else failed to balance.

She didn't stand for a lot of bullshit that's why she was checking the boat when I suggested a road trip test.

My prior experience as a road warrior had convinced me that you don't really know a person until you've been on the road with them. I had made the trip from ocean to ocean three times before I got married the first time. I regretted the fact that I hadn't road tripped with my first wife before we got married. Although two children had to be born, we might have saved ourselves some nightmares. I had rushed into that first one and wasn't gonna rush into this one.

Two years had already passed with Lynn and me....our bodies were at rest and would tend to stay at rest unless acted upon.

Times of indecision.

We had both already been married. We both carried the scars.

We had met one enchanted evening when she walked up to me and asked me if I wanted to dance.

The first song we danced to was “Hurt so Good”....John Mellencamp.

The second was “Loving You” by Elvis.

The third was “It’s All in the Game” by Tommy Edwards. When Tommy was about to sing the words “then he’ll kiss your lips” I decided to take the chance.

I kissed her lips. She kissed me back

We had been together every day since and it was going on two years. Two wonderful years. Time to clarify.

Lynn made a decision.

She said we should get married at the local justice of the peace.

She called it to question one afternoon when we were having lunch at Mario's on East Avenue our favorite Italian restaurant.

Justice of the peace was no place for me or for us as far as I was concerned.

She took it as a rejection of her love which was the opposite of my intention

For the first time, we began to wonder about the future of the relationship.

Yet, we had booked a trailer for a weekend at Darien Lake. We decided to make the trip.

We had a couple of our kids with us.

They were having a lot more fun than we were. They were outside the trailer when Lynn handed me a tiny article from the Democrat and Chronicle.

The article said “The Field of Dreams is a real place.”

All of a sudden it was clear to me.

I am a person of intuition which means I have a tendency to say out loud exactly what is flashing through my mind at the exact time that it flashes.

The flash came on.

“ Hey Lynn, If we were ever to get married, it would have to be at the most beautiful place in America. Our love deserves it. If you’re willing to travel to Iowa and if we can find this place and if it's real we could get married on the spot....right at home plate.”

She made a face that I couldn't decipher so I didn't take it as a rejection.

Then she said "Great idea. I'll call up Iowa and tell them we need a marriage license to get married at an imaginary place at an undetermined time."

I found out later that she thought I was nuts and bullshitting her at the same time.

We had seen the movie together earlier in the year. we both thought it was great. In one scene, Kevin Costner (Ray Kinsella) asked his wife Amy Madigan “is this heaven or is this Iowa” as they relaxed one starry evening on the diamond that he had carved into his cornfield.

The location was so exquisite that I thought perhaps it was the most beautiful place I had ever seen.

This was the place for us.

Plus we would give the relationship the test....a test that I firmly believed had to be taken by any couple in the tentative situation that we occupied.

So the question would be, if we were going to take a road trip when would it be. Lynn had her schedule at the bank and I had mine at the high school. During the regular school year, I taught twelfth grade English as well as Creative Writing. I also taught an elective called Cinematic Literacy. I created that one myself and it was a great success. I was approaching the peak of my teaching career.

I had ten days at the end of August, beginning of September.

Lynn had a week of undefined vacation saved up.

We had originally met on July eleventh 1987 or as we called it 7/11. On our two year anniversary, we went out to dinner at the very restaurant where Lynn had made her first proposal a month before. Midway through the meal she said "I sent away for a marriage license in Iowa. The field is located in Dyersville which is near Dubuque. We have a license waiting for us in Dubuque."

Of course I was surprised but since I hadn't been bullshitting her about the road trip idea, I said "that's great. Good job."

I didn't know if she had actually procured a license or if she was reality testing

I was mystified when she said "so if we break up this summer at least we can always say that at one time we had a marriage license in Iowa when we tell our story".

All through the month of August, we came up with reasons to take the trip and those reasons were roadblocked by objections, obstacles and realities. If Lynn wasn't exactly rocking the boat during the previous couple of weeks, she was damned sure checking for leaks.

One night, we watched Close Encounters of the Third Kind. We loved the flick and mixed it into our plan. If we headed west we would go as far as Devil's Tower in Wyoming and if we hadn't made up our mind to get married by that time, we would head back and know that we had tried goddamn it, we had tried and we had a Iowa Marrigae license to prove it.

It was also becoming clear that if we hadn't made up our mind to try the road trip this before school started, it meant that we probably should wrap up the relationship as painlessly as possible.

On August 25th, I called Lynn from my apartment and said "I was ready to go if she was''.

She wasn't ready and she hung up sorta pissed off.

This was the last possible day to make the trip and be back in time for school.

A couple hours later, I heard a knock on the door. It was Lynn.

She told me the van was in the parking lot, packed and ready to go if I was serious.

I ran into my house, packed a few things.

I climbed into the van.

"Let's go" I said.

"I'll drive"

I drove the first leg. We found rest area deep in Ohio.

We napped for a few hours. Then we went into the rest area and washed up. Lynn came out first and went behind the wheel. I started to climb into the van when an impulse struck me. As I was leaving the rest area, I saw a machine selling bio-rhythm cards. I dec ided what the hell...I went back and bought a card for that day.

It only took maybe an extra thirty seconds. I didn't like what the card said so I threw it out.

That thirty seconds would be crucial as we were headed for a blind spot that we might have missed if not for the card.

Yeah, the whole crazy pilgrimage was my idea. I talked her into it, yet it was her van that was smashed to bits.

One way or another, the journey was over.

We were alone together in a motel in LaGrange, Indiana not far from Touchdown Jesus and the Golden Dome of Notre Dame. I was beginning to get a grip on death. As we traveled from the wreckage to the hotel, I asked what time it was. When we got to the hotel, it was a half hour before the time it was when we were on our way to the hotel.

Someone explained that we had crossed the line separating one time zone from another. We had left Eastern Daylight Savings Time. That’s when I began to realize what death is/was. This was eternity. When you’re dead, you’re in Indiana and you keep crossing between time zones and Touchdown Jesus forever.

Time stabilized for awhile in the hotel. I was expecting hysterics, blame or disassociation from Lynn. Instead, I got calm, composed, courageous capability.She started working the phones.

She had a handle on what happened. She called her auto insurance company back in New York. She explained the situation.....car totaled, hotel in Indiana, etc. They wanted to know what her plan was.

To my astonishment, Lynn told them that she wanted to continue on with her journey. She outlined what she needed and what she expected to make that continuation possible.

Following that she called the American Automobile Association and got from them what we needed to continue the journey.

A few minutes later, a rental car appeared at the motel.

We drove around a bit, looking for a place to eat. We lost and gained two or three hours in that fifteen minute search.

After “lunch” we made our way to the junkyard to take a look at the van.

“Yep, it’s totaled”, the junkman asserted.

We gathered our belongings from the van and loaded them in the rental.

I could not have been more impressed by any companion.

Even though I wasn’t sure whether we were alive or not, it was clear that we were inhabiting the same realm. It was a realm, I wanted to remain in for the rest of my life/death.

I got down on one knee in that junkyard and asked Lynn to marry me.

She accepted.

August 26, 1989.

What a day.

What an eternity.

And the pilgrimage was still on.

We didn’t know if we were dead or alive but we knew we were getting married. We didn’t know where. We had a marriage license in Iowa. We had been looking for the Field of Dreams which we heard was in Dyersville. We drove through that town. There’s a lot of farms in Dyersville and a lot of corn. We couldn’t find the farm that we were looking for. We were hungry, tired, not sure if we were alive and headed for a place that might not exist. We were in a rented van.

We turned right at the end of the driveway. We drove about a hundred yards. And then...we saw a paper plate.....nailed to a tree....on the plate two words and an arrow.....Movie site....arrow pointed right.

We took that right turn and a half mile down the road, there it was....The Field of Dreams. No doubt. Right exactly out of the film and out of my dreams.

Perfect.

We drove down that long driveway and met a man who was working in the yard. I asked him if he was the owner of the place.

He said that he wasn’t but that the owner was out in the cornfield on his tractor.

I saw the man on the tractor in the corn and walked towards him. He turned his tractor to meet me.

When we were about ten feet apart, he turned off the tractor and turned his blue eyes on me.

“Can I help you?” asked the man on the tractor.

He looked at me and realized that there was something going on here and he wasn’t sure what it was.

Then he answered in the most perplexing way possible.

“It’s whatever you want it to be.’

I said, “whatever it is, it’s the most beautiful place I’ve ever seen. I want it to be the place where we get married.”

He said “You can do that.”

I asked “Would Friday be all right.”

He said “that would be fine.”

We shook hands.

On that Friday, he would be our best man. His name was Don Lansing.

I told Lynn the great news.

We got in our car and drove to Devil’s Tower. We had originally said that we would go as far West as Devil’s Tower and if we hadn’t made up our minds by then, well we’d head back home and take a break. Of course, we had already made up our minds thanks to the junkyard proposal.

We returned Thursday night.

Don greeted us warmly and invited us into the house. Yeah, the house in the movie. Don wanted to know what we were going to wear. All we had left were our jeans. Don went to the phone and called the local tux shop. They had one tux left. Don asked if we wanted a cake. We said yeah. He got on the phone and called the local bakery. He asked Lynn how big the cake should be. She said big enough for fifty. I laughed out loud. We didn’t know a single person in Iowa aside from Don and the guy who originally greeted us, a guy named Butch who was a caretaker for the field and his wife Annie.

The next day, we went back into town. The dress was made. Beautiful like in a dream. We drove to the town office to pick up our wedding license. Lynn had sent away for one before we left on our pilgramage. By the time we got to the office the word had already spread. We got our license. They told us that they had heard all about the plan and so had the local television station. They wanted to interview us.

We met the reporter and she seemed very interested in our story. She had a full camera crew with her. We told them that we had arranged for a justice of the peace to do the honors. We told them about the car crash.

The town barber had heard about all of this and volunteered to give me a haircut while Lynn tried on her dress.

By that time it was getting late. We stopped at a restaurant to have our last meal as single people. We looked up at the teevee and there we were on the local news. We watched ourselves telling our story.

We made it back to the house. By this time, a bunch of neighbors had gathered.

I went into the room where in the movie Ray’s daughter looks out the window and says “something’s gonna happen out there.”just before the ghost shows up.

I had the same view of the field and I knew that indeed something was gonna happen out there. We were gonna get married. The ghosts were gonna show up.

I made sure I had the wedding ring which we had bought at Wall Drugs in South Dakota. The rings were made from genuine Black Hills gold.

By this time about fifty people had gathered.

I left the house and walked into the corn in left field. I figured that since I still wasn’t sure that I was alive that I should come out of the corn like the ghosts did.

I made my way to the pitchers mound where I met Don. I was on the mound for a few moments when the fifty people started to ooh and ahh as Lynn emerged from the house. Suddenly everything was in transcendent five dimension. I couldn’t have dreamed of a more beautiful bride.

After the ceremony, we went back to the porch. The towns folk had brought fixings. We ate the cake together. They all wanted pictures so we posed for awhile. We drank some champagne that somebody had provided. We bid them farewell.

The next day we were home. On the flight back, we told the stewardess our story and she put us in first class. Sitting right next to us was Maury Wills, the ex-Dodger shortstop who had once stole a hundred bases in a season. She told Maury the story and he congratulated us.

We made it home in time for the Ring of Fire around Canadaigua Lake.

We’re going to be celebrating our thirtieth anniversary next week.

We’re still going the distance and easing each other’s pain.

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