Jason Folded His Arms Flamboyantly

  • by jenchocolate ice cream on his upper lip
  • “No, that isn’t elegant.”
  • only I can see her
  • the rat-faced one
  • I’m pissed off and grossed out

Tune in next time part 287                           Click Here for Earlier Installments

Jason folded his arms flamboyantly across his chest, but his posturing was ruined by the chocolate ice cream on his upper lip. Not that the mimes noticed or cared. They all pretended to clap.

I laid Tesla in the underbrush and moved rapidly to a position in the shadows, but still near enough to Jason that I could pounce on him if necessary.

The woman who had been singing before Jason’s arrival started up again, a bastardized version of Frosty the Snowman this time. As she sang she stepped into the firelight. Her face was obscured behind a thick layer of whiteface and a big red rubber nose. She approached my brother, holding out the ruffled muff of a clown as if it were a lei.

Jason shook his head. “No, that isn’t elegant.” He took a step backward when she insisted. “It will ruin the lines of my cape.” He couldn’t retreat any further without stepping into the fire.

The woman worked her reply into her song. “Remove your cape, you won’t need it anyway.”

Oh shit. This was some sort of mime/clown fertility ritual. I recognized the trappings now that it was too late to do anything about it.

Jason dropped his cape beside the bonfire. The mimes all tied imaginary blindfolds over their eyes. The woman slipped out of her rainbow striped leotard, exposing the robotic unicorn tattoo on her ass.

Tessa!

I murmured to myself, “With the mimes all blindfolded, only I can see her true identity.”

One of the mimes, the rat-faced one on the far right, cocked his head like he’d heard me. And suddenly I didn’t care.

As Tessa and Jason embraced in a greasy smear of makeup and squeaking nose noises, I strode out and said, “I’m pissed off and grossed out in equal measure. What the hell do you think you’re doing, Tessa? I thought we meant something to each other, and here you are naked with my brother!”

Unfortunately my tirade woke Tesla, who jumped to her feet, suddenly reminding me that I’d slept with several of Tessa’s sisters and probably didn’t have any grounds for my outburst.

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Srsly, They’re Almost Done

Progress update on Son and Grandson of Science Novel: they’re still almost done.

All the outstanding comments in both projects have been cleared. The placeholders are filled in, and descriptions punched up and made consistent, and nearly all the new scenes have been written. It seems like for every scene we knock off the list, there are two more getting added. But this hydra will be slain ere the month is out! Forsooth!

Writing books two and three in tandem, and now simultaneously, certainly wasn’t the least stressful approach we could have taken. There were advantages, such as being able to get deeply enmeshed with the cast and the story world, and fine tune both books for thematic resonance and high-level plot development. But it made for a really long trip. We’ve got ourselves pretty well adapted to completing one first draft and then switching into a different mode for a while. Doubling the duration of that prose stretch — spoiler alert — made it twice as long! We’re jonesing pretty hard to focus on something else.

We’ll have the books done soon. Meanwhile, have a picture of the two best, craziest pooches we know.

Lady Marzipan and her consort, the Bandit Lord

Jason Started Rapping

  • by Kentthis only happens in the movies
  • Maybe. With a capital M
  • Matthew Clemens is a tool
  • gives me that slimy smile of his
  • we watched professional bowling

Tune in next time part 286                           Click Here for Earlier Installments

Jason started rapping. Which, bad as it was, still came as sort of a relief considering all the alternatives. His routine kept the mimes mesmerized long enough for me to open the gate and carry Tesla out into the fresh air. His flow was not mad, more like peevish. Either there were nuances in it that I couldn’t pick up on, or mimes are just easy to please.

I paid attention to every word, in case he was sending someone a coded message.

Matty mighta said this only happens in the movies.
And to get real we’re gonna hafta remove these
idealized betrayals and the stars who portray them.
Too cynical? Maybe. With a capital Mayhem.
But once upon a time the lessons we learned in school
showed all of us that Matthew Clemens is a tool, fool.
I freak whenever he gives me that slimy smile of his
and I just wait for the day I can get outta the biz.
Until that day arrives I can only keep on rolling
And fondly recall the times we watched professional bowling.

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Before the Unseen Singer Could Begin Her Song Anew

  • by jen“El Matador,” they whispered
  • all the legitimacy money could buy
  • uncle was the curator of the museum of mineralogy
  • 1200 pounds of high-grade marijuana
  • put down the syphon

Tune in next time part 285                           Click Here for Earlier Installments

Before the unseen singer could begin her song anew, a caped figure stepped into the circle of light around the bonfire. The mimes all noticed at the same time. “El Matador,” they whispered not with their voices, but with their fluttering finger motions. And they were right. It was El Matador, which was the name my twin brother Jason used before he became America’s #1 wedding rapper. When he’d first left the spy game, Jason tried to make it big in Cancun’s underground hip hop scene, relying on all the legitimacy money could buy at the current exchange rate, and counting on the fact that our uncle was the curator of the Museum of Mineralogy of Quintana Roo to lend him copious street cred. It worked surprisingly well during spring break, when all of the American college students were in town. He’d have huge concerts where he passed around 1200 pounds of high-grade marijuana as party favors. It was enough to get the frat boys to put down the syphon and the beer bong, but it was economically unsustainable.

Was he here today to rap? Or something even worse?

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We’ve Made a Huge Mistake

Or rather, a very tiny one. Our tactical blunder’s name is the Bandit Lord, and as you can see he’s made of trouble.

For those of you who’ve never had a young Bandit Lord around the Writing Cave, or the house, let us warn you that if you fall prey to one you will never again accomplish anything besides keeping the young Bandit Lord from destroying everything you hold dear.

In addition to running interference between the Bandit Lord and Lady Marzipan, we’ve been on constant alert for tiny teeth gnawing on electrical cords, wastebaskets, socks, carpets, zippers, our fingers… the list is infinite. His current schedule is chaotic, to put it charitably, which makes it very difficult to carve out uninterrupted writing time. We’re currently experimenting with working in shifts. One of us follows the Bandit Lord around his kingdom, putting out fires and appeasing the peasants, while the other retreats to the Writing Cave and tries to knock out a few hundred words. It’s really not the most efficient way to write a novel, but it’s better than nothing. And all too soon the Bandit Lord will be a haughty and merciless overlord.

You can see it in his face.

 

I Thought This Was The Same Song

  • by Kentbut I was much wrong
  • “Keep your hands above your head.”
  • The cat regarded him distantly
  • he would never have wings
  • “Look, the scab’s gone.”

Tune in next time part 284                           Click Here for Earlier Installments

I thought this was the same song I’d heard as a child, but I was much wrong. Some lyrics were the same, like “Keep your hands above your head.” But that only added to my befuddlement when it swerved into unfamiliar lines.

The acoustic properties of the sewer opening made the words even harder to follow because reverberations inside the soupy tunnel lagged several seconds behind what was happening out around the bonfire. Tesla’s snoring didn’t help, either.

Near as I could tell, the song was about someone named Simon Nomis, who tried to befriend a cat. The cat regarded him distantly. Simon seemed to be quite a whiner, and possibly a failed caterpillar, based on the recurring line saying “he would never have wings.”

What made me realize it was not just a folk song, but a coded message, was the closing line: “Look, the scab’s gone.” Operatives from the Academy have used that countersign for decades.

Without hearing the lyrics more clearly, though, I couldn’t hope to decode the meaning in the song.

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I Could No Longer Smell the Sewage We Were Adrift Upon

  • by jenbut because of the fog
  • “We can work this out.”
  • smell the woodsmoke
  • the tune was Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer
  • aspect of Wikipedia that I dislike

Tune in next time part 283                           Click Here for Earlier Installments

I could no longer smell the sewage we were adrift upon, but because of the fog that rose from it I was unable to forget it was there. When we finally escaped I would have to take, just, like, all the showers.

Tesla napped, curled up on her side of the swan boat’s bench. I wanted to wake her up and work with her to figure out a way out of our dilemma. I would say something really persuasive and motivating like, “We can work this out.” But Tesla was a sound sleeper and so I didn’t get a chance to even try before we rounded a long, lazy corner and I could finally see the light at the end of the sewer pipe. We were so close to freedom I could even smell the woodsmoke coming in through the grate.

Our swan came to a sludgy stop against the grate. I left Tesla sleeping while I peered out and tried to make sense of what I saw. We were still on my brothers’ island, of course, so I had to be careful.

The smoke came from an enormous bonfire around which danced a dozen mimes in ceremonial garb. The song was one I’d heard many times growing up. The lyrics, sung by someone I couldn’t see, were nothing you’d recognize, but the tune was Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.

I tried once to research this song, but all trace of it had been erased from the internet. That is the aspect of Wikipedia that I dislike the most, its willingness to delete any page that the Guild of Fire Eaters demands.

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Gardening

Last night we planted Jen’s tomatoes and poppies. Kent enjoys playing in the dirt, and Jen is good at supervising him, so it seems to have turned out quite well.

It’s tempting to turn gardening into a writing metaphor, but it doesn’t lend itself. Pages don’t form like fruit on a vine if you just get enough water and sunlight. Putting words on a page isn’t really like putting roots into soil.

Living things are certainly sources of inspiration. A growing plant could be an apt metaphor for the underlying creative force. That an idea could be like a seed, and blossom in the imagination, is a familiar notion. Writers do need creativity, and sometimes our ideas need to be nurtured. On the other hand, some ideas are like weeds.

Having ideas is not writing, though. Writing as an activity, a process. It’s the work that turns those ideas into meaningful output. Later this summer, Jen will put her tomatoes into recipes. Ideas are ingredients, the author a chef. There, we knew we’d find a good metaphor somewhere in this.

It’s good to get away from your desk now and then, get some dirt under your fingernails. Or, watch from up on the deck while your writing partner gets it under his.

“Why Did You Do That?”

  • by Kentthreatened to kill again
  • she had heard the very same story from her friends
  • similarities between Facebook’s rapid adoption and the proliferation of an infectious disease
  • left the embittered old bastard
  • among the ruins

Tune in next time part 282                           Click Here for Earlier Installments

“Why did you do that?” I screamed at Tesla. (Also, how? was my unvoiced follow-up question.)

While the slow but relentless flow of sewage carried us farther from the way out, she told me a lengthy tale involving the choir and their pact with the magic dweebs. I lost some of the details musing on what a great band name “The Magic Dweebs” would be, but the upshot was that Mr Bug-Wand allegedly murdered a teacher, and had threatened to kill again. Tesla had learned of all this by reading our rival school’s newsletter, but she knew it was true because she had heard the very same story from her friends in metal shop.

“But you didn’t take shop,” I said. “Your name was on the list of fugitives I saw while raiding the office files.” She gave me a calculating look. “I mean,” I stammered, “that’d be their album title. ‘Metal Shop,’ by The Magic Dweebs.”

The result of her calculations was giving me the silent treatment. So we drifted without speaking on a river whose odor brought to mind the similarities between Facebook’s rapid adoption and the proliferation of an infectious disease. The horrid stench battered my nasal passages like an illegitimate uncle banging on the front door in the middle of the night. Finally, after what seemed like hours, olfactory fatigue left the embittered old bastard among the ruins of my mucous membranes.

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Magic Spells Were Way Outside My Area of Expertise

  • by jenif they intend to keep their trousers on
  • he likes to sing along
  • army of gargoyle angels
  • astroturf vest
  • “I was very much surprised.”

Tune in next time part 281                           Click Here for Earlier Installments

Magic spells were way outside my area of expertise. At the Academy that sort of thing is studied only by nerds, and only then if they intend to keep their trousers on until well after graduation. Tesla had never struck me as that sort of girl. It made me wonder where she got her information.

Whether or not there was magic involved, the weird, robed dude was waving a bug sprayer around and I really didn’t want to get a faceful of whatever he had on offer. I slowed my pedaling to a pace that kept us even with the boat ramp despite the current, but I didn’t approach.

“You know this guy?” I asked Tesla.

“Oh come on, you must remember him!” she said. “He was at the Academy at the same time we were. He likes to sing along with that group of students that sounds like an army of gargoyle angels.”

“You mean the choir?” The Academy was not known for its arts programs.

She snapped the fingers of both hands and pointed at me. “That’s what they called themselves! Remember how they always wore those astroturf vests?”

“The first time I saw them perform,” I said, “I was very much surprised.”

I squinted through the murk at the madman on the shore. He and his conspiracy theories and his fancy squirt gun were all that stood between me and an escape from the sewer. I decided to go for it. I didn’t believe in magic, and I could hold my breath for a really long time, at least long enough to get past him. With much determination I applied my feet to the swan boat’s pedals.

“No!” Tesla shrieked.

She reached down between my legs, and with surprising strength, twisted the pedal mechanism into a knot. We immediately began drifting with the current, away from the boat ramp.

It was then that I realized that I was up shit creek without a pedal.

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