Stouffville, Ontario Canada (647) 962-1997 gwstudios@rogers.com M-F 8:30am - 2:30pm & 8:00pm - 11:00pm

Tag: work in progress

“Can you at least look at me when I’m trying to talk to you…

greatwallstudiosLeave a Comment on “Can you at least look at me when I’m trying to talk to you…

Scott. Put down the controller, take off the head set, and talk to me. God. You’re a big fucking man child. No! No, don’t you dare put that head set back on. Fuck you Scott, Fuck. You.” I’m standing in the doorway to the den, the walls to this windowless room are covered in old creased band posters, and framed sports memorabilia. The room is cluttered with comic books, action figures and empty beer cans. It smells like a gym sock, mixed with a cheap dive bar. I’m surprised there’s no stripper pole in there. The vents are always shut, and he can never be bothered to vacuum. The old dull grey carpet feels gritty underfoot.

“Huh? What’s that? Oh, oh, hey hold up. Sorry fellas…” he’s so calm, talking to his buddies through his head set, getting off the line, logging out as slowly as fucking possible. I can feel my pulse begin to rise. “Baby, babe! Yo… you ok, what’s goin’ on now?” He’s trying me, good god, lord above he’s trying out his, Hi I’m this super charming guy, voice on me. I could just slap him. My blood is pumping, and I’m not in the mood for this frat boy, laid back bullshit. “You know damn well what’s up. You man child! You fucking man baby! Look at all this shit, toys?, Scott really?, you got children’s toys in here. Comic books, toys, video games and fucking model kits. What. The. Fuck!” I clap my hands to punctuate each word. I turn from the doorway, and storm down the hall. It’s the longest stretch of our apartment, it makes for wonderful dramatic effect. I know he’s watching my ass as I storm away. I know it, and I’ll use it against him.

“This again, christ all mighty baby, you gonna do me like that, here? now!” He’s storming down the hall behind me, all one hundred eighty five pounds of him, he is chiseled like marble. He stops outside of arms reach. I can hear his breath coming faster. I can see spittle flecked on his lips as he gets going. “No, no Cheryl, not here. I told you I have to keep things stress free here. You know how bad work gets! You know. You KNOW!” His voice is quavering, and starts to take on a pleading tone. “No, you know what baby, you don’t know. No, don’t shake your finger at me. You want to know what I did yesterday. Do you, do you want to know?” He steps in close to me, I can see it in the whites of his hazel brown eyes, he ain’t going to hold back, he’s going to drop some hot scathing truth in my lap, and I’ll feel both intense love for him for it, and I’ll absolutely hate that I can’t even comprehend it. “Do you want to know what I came across yesterday, at werk!… I came across a mini van, with three kids in the back with their heads cut off at the base of the jaw…”. “Baby, God no, no… don’t say it Honey… please.” I’m pulled into his arms but the dam has broken and he’s not going to stop until it’s burned permanently into my heart. Like surgery done with an ice pick and a blow torch. “Seems the parents were junkies, love doing smack. But what they don’t know is, is that shit got fentanyl in it. Wife was driving, she’s dead as soon as the plunger drops the load in her veins, hot and thick. She couldn’t even pull off the road she was so hot for a quick taste. Crosses through the median, under an oncoming truck full of steel pipes. BAM. bitch, cut those sweet little Angel’s heads right off they necks… they wasn’t even in fucking car seats. Those kids was loose. LOOSE!” I can feel the room start to spin around us. He’s holding onto me just as hard as I hold onto him for support. We collapse together, a puddle of anger, loathing and despair. I think the floor might open up and swallow us whole. Before I can even lean in to stroke his hair, his pager is buzzing on the kitchen counter. Like a shot, he’s up and out the door. I hear something, but it is muffled by the closing door. I can’t make out what it was.

“Well, Cheryl I’m so sorry to hear of your husband’s passing. At least you told him you love him as he left for work that day. Few of us get the chance. It’s not like you two had a fight that day. I mean jesus, could you imagine?” She leans in towards me. “I hear Janis and Robert had a real banger the day he died. It’s eating her alive. But not us. No, we spent the last moments with our noble hunks in the throes of passion.” She’s smiling at me over her wine glass. The red wine must be good, it leaves a slight film on the glass every time she gesticulates with her hands. She smells of flowery perfume, and cigarette smoke. I look through her, to the open bay window beyond. Outside children can be heard playing. They’re laughing, and giggling. “Yeah… at least I have that.”

“You know what I love the most about being out here?…

greatwallstudios1 Comment on “You know what I love the most about being out here?…

The unobstructed view of the galaxy around us. Don’t you just love it!” She says, looking back at me, over her right shoulder. Her orange coveralls tied firmly around her waist. Her socks, and her shirt are a brilliant white, not a speck of dirt on them.

“Hmmm… no, all I keep thinking about is how isolated it is out here, and how far we are from anything, or anyone.” I say, staring down at the now ice cold bulb of mock coffee. It’s inky, black-brown packaging has golden markings all over it. I can’t read it. It was a gift from the Chinese agency, from last Christmas. It smells faintly of roasted cinnamon.

“Well, I really can’t get enough of this view, I mean what a breathtaking vista that is spread out before us.” She says it with that ear to ear grin she always has. It makes her dimples pop, her ice blue eyes twinkle in the brilliant starlight. Every day now, she comes to stand at the same view port, always looking forwards – to the stars. I’m hunched over a tiny table that converts to tuck back into the bulkhead. I stand up, and toss my bulb of frozen black coffee into an incinerator bin. This capsule, the Non Sequitur, was meant for ten, still feels cramped, even with just the four of us. A long cylinder of off white padded curved walls, illuminated in phosphorescent white light that has started to show some wear and tear. I will give them this, The Company does love to recycle. This is my seventh uneventful mission out here with one of the jury rigged crafts. “You know… we… I… hmmm, that first twenty nine week stretch out to Mars was tedious. I didn’t get any worth while readings, and there is no sign of the anomaly.” I am not happy. This line of work was supposed to be cutting edge. For fuck’s sake, it is space travel, and you promised us adventure, aliens, or at the very least a chance to bring about the singularity before the fall of mankind. We ventured out here in search of something, anything, anything at all that could be the key to unlocking our full potential as a species. And all I got was this lousy t-shirt. “I am not looking forward to eighty more weeks of this before we make it out to Pluto.” I have been glum for quite some time. I never could muster the same enthusiasm for these missions. Even with the pressure of the world on my shoulders. I just don’t care anymore.

“Same time tomorrow then darling.” She giggles as she says it. Every time with this same schtick. I’m annoyed, but I chuckle anyway. “Of course babe, say hello to our girls for me.” Jennifer vanishes in the dim light, leaving me all of the sparse, utilitarian room. The bright padding fades away to reveal the gathered filth and blood splatter of neglect. The fabric throughout the cabin is stained jet black in places, it reeks of smoke, and decay. The lights inside the observation pod have not come on in quite some time.

Outside the capsule, sparks continue to fall away from the craft’s hull like a giant rooster tail of cascading embers. A large black burn stretches across the jagged edge of what’s left of the crew quarters. There in the distance are vague forms of a woman and two children, suspended in their bed pods, both flash frozen, and boiled in the vacuum of space. The capsule is half a million miles off course, even though the engines and navigation survived the attack in one piece. Denial, much like the void of space, does not discriminate.

 

PART I

 

*****

And NOW for shits and giggles you can listen to me narrate Chapter One .

“Listen here dickhead, do you hear the words coming out of my mouth…

greatwallstudiosLeave a Comment on “Listen here dickhead, do you hear the words coming out of my mouth…

I know what I saw, ok, I mean jesus, why you guys always gotta give me shit about this stuff. Fuck!” She’s leaning against the wall, the torn Gucci shirt has fallen over the edge of her shoulder. She is visibly shaken, the incident has taken some of the polish off her demeanor, but my god is she ever mad. You do not want to get within arms reach of her now. We’ve only gone and pissed her off further with our line of questioning. Standing across from her in the tiny interrogation room, she moves to lift her leg to scratch at a newly formed scab on her calf, she stops abruptly and pulls a long drag off of her cigarette instead. The accumulated ash tumbles off the edge, and lands on the front of her skirt. It’s tweed, an A-line cut, as my wife would later describe it to me, and looks to have been expensive, that is, until some dipshit bro thought she needed a date for the evening.

“Look, I am not here to bust your balls, ok? I just need some answers. Your clothes are all kinds of fucked up, and we’ve got what’s left of some dudes corpse downstairs.” She flinches at the mention of the body, I can tell she’s more shaken than she’s letting on. I should offer the counselors services again, but the last one got an earful, and a gold pen to the kneecap.

The smoke she is exhaling is hanging above us in lazy curls. Wafting up to the ceiling, and settling in a haze by the flickering phosphorescent lights. The tiles on the wall are chipped and cracking. The light here is a dim blue, meant to stop junkies from easily finding a vein. The chatter from out in the hallway is just barely audible. A constant smattering of barks, shouts and ringing phones. I can hear a reel to reel recorder in the next room, tick, tick, ticking as the end of the tape flaps freely. Restless people are watching us from behind a smudged, and dirty two way mirror. They are shuffling in their seats, it’s the squeak of the vinyl that gives them away.

“Why does it always stink like farts in here man, like, what the fuck you guys eat in here anyhow?” Trying to antagonize us – always brings a smile to her face. Underneath that Sephora make up is a ruthless, cunning lawyer with sharks teeth in her vagina. She’s not going to give us anything. Running down the clock, and we’ll just stand here, dicks in our hands, mouths agape while she lights up cigarette after cigarette. They are a crisp bright white, and that very fine linen paper, with the ultra wide filter tips. The brown matches her shoes. I have no clue if that’s intentional with Sophia or not.

“What do you think happened here”

greatwallstudiosLeave a Comment on “What do you think happened here”

He says from over my shoulder. I am looking at the body in front of me, laid prone on the floor in a massive puddle of dark icor. “Well, hmmm… from the looks of it, I’d say he put two in the chest, and one in his head, painting that wall over there with bits of brains, skull fragments and hair.” I stand up slowly, have been having nasty head rushes as of late, when getting up from a crouch. “No, not that, my sandwich! Look there’s like one strip of bacon, and like half a leaf of lettuce. Jesus, don’t the rookies even look at this shit before they bring it to us.” He’s mad, turning this way and that, looking to get up in someones face, anyone within arms reach. “Oh come off it. Lunch was an hour ago, put that down and help me put together a reasonable theory of the case.” I spit the words out, realizing my lunch didn’t do much to satisfy my hunger today either. Irritated, we walk out the front door of this rat infested apartment, with its dangling light bulbs, and chipped paint on all the trim. The shared hall is choked with cops, and partially dressed angry neighbours. They’re all in a huff over the noise, and foot traffic coming and going at all hours. Really they’re just mad they can’t smoke crack or meth while so many cops are around. The floors creak under the additional strain of so many bodies. The temperature inside this hundred year old building is intense. Humidity of high summer has condensed on the walls, dribbling down to make foul smelling pools mixed with discarded cigarette ash, and garbage.

“Oh hey! Mind that puddle over there by that green door.” An elderly gentleman says, he has an indistinct, yet exotic look to him. Thinning dark hair, and a far too short kimono over what I could only describe as neon pink fishnets. “Huh? What’s that sir?”. I shout over the din of the gathered crowd. “Well, just steer clear of that shit. You know old lady Darcy’s a hoarder. That cloying smell of rot, vomit, and god knows what is her doing! Can’t even open her front door, it’s so chock full of shit in there.” He is becoming animated with all the young officers around, staring at him. “Some delivery dude came round here last week in fucking flip flops, had to go see a doctor because that puddle of sludge caused a pus ridden growth on both his feet. Fuck’in nasty. Banged on her door for like an hour, in a rage, he was. Poor kid. But what do I know…” My partner mimics the wanking motion with his left hand, the poor man’s soggy blt flopping about in his right. Mayo has collected on his lip, mixed in to his five o’clock shadow. He smells of cheap cologne, and sweat. We turn for the stairs, the black railing is peeling, it shows about twenty layers of caked on lead paint, and walk down the five flights to our squad car. The temperature outside isn’t any better, neither is the smell. Through a cracked window the radio cackles with an indecipherable muffled call. Followed by several clipped responses. In a rumpled tan suit, my partner shouts over the top of the car to me. I don’t hear it.

“Babe, can you come upstairs, Sarah’s been sick again…

greatwallstudiosLeave a Comment on “Babe, can you come upstairs, Sarah’s been sick again…

And it’s all over her bed sheets, her carpet, down the hall and seeping into the heating vents by the toilet.” With fuzzy, light blinded eyes I catch a glimpse of my wife walking back up the stairs from the landing. Pulling my sheets back, I feel the bracing chill of the late night air in my room. “God damn!” I blurt out as I step down, bare footed on the cold vinyl flooring, it feels like I’m standing on a sheet of ice. Lumbering half awake, I come to the stairs. My legs not yet functioning, my ankles creaking along with the old steps. Rubbing my hands on my thighs, feeling the fleece of my pants against my palms. Flexing my fingers, I mount the last few steps. Coming to the main floor I’m hit with the stench of it all. From the bathroom I can hear my daughter weeping, my wife a gentle murmur in the distance. I can hear snippets of their conversations…”No, no baby, you’re not in trouble, it’s ok, don’t cry, I know, I know.” There is a flurry of activity as my wife strips off the soiled pajamas and lays down towels to soak up some of the mess. I turn down the hallway, and grab a mop and bucket. I squeeze out some lemon scented soap and I can feel the steam from the hot water. The vapour is condensing on the cold window over the sink, rivulets of water pooling at the base of the sill. I pull down some paper towels, and grab an old plastic bag from a drawer. It’s sticky, and has an old crumpled up receipt in it, something that was beige had been in this bag.

“You two go curl up in bed, I’ve got you some water to drink, and I’ll strip off your bed after I wash the floors.” It’s the same script as before. We’ve done it so many times, I can move through the motions without having to think about it anymore. Afterwards I’ll fall asleep on the floor of my daughter’s room. I crash about, like a drunk searching for a full bottle among all of the empties strewn about the house. The smell is what gets me, never the sight of it. How can so much come out of such a small child. Looks the same, regardless of the end it originated.

After a time, I notice there is a sliver of light in the master bedroom, standing in the hall I can hear softly spoken words, lilting in a sing song fashion. Sarah is falling asleep in my wife’s tired arms. They are sharing a pillow as they cuddle. I can see sweat on my daughters brow. “This fever just won’t fucking break”. I say it aloud, but quietly, to myself. I need to grab more pain meds from the drugstore tomorrow. Turning from the doorway, I shut off the lights, and I collapse onto a pile of stuffed animals. Everything goes black.

I can hear the clock, the seconds are ticking over as…

greatwallstudiosLeave a Comment on I can hear the clock, the seconds are ticking over as…

I sit here, in the stuffy, cramped, poorly lit waiting room that stinks of passed gas and desperation. The drab walls are covered in old posters, they look as though they came with the building. Torn, creased posters of a time gone by. Taped up and taped over with each successive room owner. Between coughs, burps and the occasional gasp of pain, all you can really hear is the soft murmur of far off voices, hidden down the long hall, behind a beaten up partition of dubious make. The neon lights are buzzing, the quality of air in here is making me uncomfortable. Why are there no windows? Why are there no vents? Why did I wear such a heavy jacket, there’s never anywhere to hang it, and I’m sweating through my shirt. I’m increasingly aware of the unpleasant aroma emanating from my work shoes. Blessed with foul smelling feet, halitosis and psoriasis. Even though everyone here is lost in their own pain or suffering, I feel everyone’s eyes upon me, flickering back an forth, from flat out stares to furtive glances. I fucking hate it here.

A printer chimes to life, and a warm slip of paper pops out, only the flop to the floor. The receptionist is no where to be seen. A pile of papers has begun to form. I fucking hate it here. “What was that?” The elderly lady beside me who reeks of death quietly asks, her hot sickly breath filling my face, eeking it’s way into my lungs. I feel as though I can taste her. “Hmmm. What? Nothing. Nothing.” I squirm in my soft pleather seat, hating the soreness in my back and the ache between my shoulder blades. My hair has started to mat to my head in the places that static hasn’t made it stand up on end. The heat in here is oppressive. The printer comes alive – again, more papers flit to the floor. We are all unattended.

I can see the shadows growing longer…

greatwallstudiosLeave a Comment on I can see the shadows growing longer…

As the sun sets back behind the row of old mangled spruce trees. They really haven’t been the same since that last wind storm. It just blew through here like a god damned menace. Took half the shingles off the west side of the fucking barn. It was absolutely mental. You really couldn’t even hear yourself think, for the howl of the wind and the screach of twisting fensing. God, what an awful mess the last few weeks have been.

The last few moments of mottled sunlight pierce my eyes like Knives. “You know, mum really loves this view because of those trees. You remember how fucking mad she was when dad tried his hand at pruning them…”. My younger brother is standing beside me, dressed in a drab grey suit, clinging to his coffee cup, like it’s a life raft in a raging river. It’s cold, icy black waters threatening to swallow him whole. Pull him underneath, drag him down in the fast flowing current. I turn away from the view, it’s the same stretch of lawn I’d known for as long as I can remember. Turning my back to my brother, I cross the room, it’s somber dressing a reminder that things have changed. Nothing is the same, even as everything here is the same. Stopping at the door I say “It was a nice service. Food was a bit shit, for what they charged us… Bastards”. Twirling around, as though jolted out of his revere, my brother quips ” And what’s up with the vicar, what a thick fuck he is. Got her bloody name wrong, twice!”.

The sun has totally disappeared behind the stand of trees, the farm is that strange mix of dark but also still light out. The carpet smells a bit musty. There is cigarette smoke lingering on the walls, embedded in the paint, like so many other things left unsaid.

“What are you doing, you’ve had that song on repeat for like…

greatwallstudiosLeave a Comment on “What are you doing, you’ve had that song on repeat for like…

A full fucking hour.” She says, lifting the headphones up and off my ear. Just as suddenly, she falls backwards into her torn armchair, resuming reading her book. I sit forward in my seat, and put my pen down on my desk. It rolls away from my finger tips, falling down to the floor with a clatter. Angrily adjusting my head phones I turn towards her and say ” Jesus!, it’s so close, it’s right there, I just can’t figure out what that idea was. It was so vivid last night. I’m sure I was listening to this song when it came to me.” Clearly, I am irritable, and slightly disheveled, as I gesticulate wildly. The paper in front of me is blank, except for crossed out half thoughts and angry scribbles. Lowering her book down slightly, peering over the top she remarks. “Babe, you fell asleep on the couch last night. You didn’t even make it past Jeopardy.” Sitting stock still with my fingers pinching the bridge of my nose. “Well,… shit. I dreamt that?” Rocking back deeper into her arm chair, it’s hard stripes at odds with the growing shadows of the late afternoon, she laughs. A full throated bark. It echoes in our quiet mid town apartment. Softly, I can hear the neighbours dog yapping in reply. The old plaster walls really don’t dampen much between units here. Standing up from my chair, I grab the sheet of paper, cross the room, haphazardly covered with crumpled pieces of paper, I fold it a couple times and drop it into the recycling. I stop a moment to watch it float soundlessly into the bin. Car horns can be heard outside, a bird chirps and a siren screams in passing. The sun has begun to set, and along the sidewalk street lamps are starting to stir.

Writing the second draft of my short children’s story

greatwallstudiosLeave a Comment on Writing the second draft of my short children’s story

Here’s a wee bit of a conundrum for you. As I sit here writing the second draft of my short children’s story, I’m struck by who my audience is. Do I write it so that two to six year olds enjoy the story, the written portion, or do I make it so that a parent would enjoy reading it? I know that in most cases, the children will look at the pictures more so than the written text, so it seems I’d be more likely to read books to my kids that I enjoy reading myself. Not that it would need to rhyme or have some sort of gimmick to it, but just that the characters seems to be multi dimensional, or show signs of using their imaginations in a positive manner. I should really come back and map out what I want to say here. Perhaps some point form notes will help.

• Multi dimensional characters  • Fun for adults to read, but with subject matter that means something to both parents and children  • Showing that girls can have mechanical engineering leanings, and like working with their hands, and doing all sorts of tasks • Showing empathy for animals  • Being a leader, but also a functional part of a team  • Using their imaginations, unlimited by gender stereotypes • Bright colourful drawings and illustrations (more of a personal preference, again, and a high bar for my later steps of actually drawing the spreads)

I’d love to see that my own kids like the story, and the characters, but I’d also love to see if it was something that other parents could get behind. Also, if I put multiple adventures in one story, is there a call to put out more, where only one adventure happens per story? It’s for kids, so maybe that’ll never be a real concern.

Who knows how many drafts I’ll end up doing. I keep vacillating between deepening the story and expanding it, and cutting out extraneous portions, as at this point, the focus would likely be on the drawings and the written stuff is just there to augment that. Questions, questions. So many questions I need to keep asking and answering at each bench mark throughout this process. Although when I get it all done once, I can use what I’ve learned from it to adjust how I would possible do another at a later date.

Plus I came up with this idea when I only had the one child, now that I have two, I will need to work in a third character, or else things could get heated for me here at home! Ha. It sort of surprises me just how long I’ve been thinking of doing this one specific project. I remember I was pruning some hedges out back, while my eldest and our dog were playing in the yard with me, and I thought about all the silly things I could imagine her imagining them both doing. The Zoom Zoom Zoom song had just been taught to us at her play group, so walking on the moon was a big thing that couple of weeks. Funny how those little moments can bring something about.

Hopefully I don’t talk this up too much, and then when it drops be a total misfire/flop. But realistically if my kids like it, who TF cares what anyone else thinks of it.