Note: I took a Creative Writing course in college. These are some of the pieces.
spider was taken from a journal entry of mine and submitted to the De Anza literary magazine Red Wheelbarrow. It was published in the 2019 fall edition.
spider
I was getting ready to take a shower. When I began to run the water, I noticed a small spider trying to crawl out of the tub near the spout. I shrugged and twisted the knobs and the water flooded out towards the spider; it began trying to climb up the shower walls. I watched it for a while, waiting for it to get sucked down into the whirlpool and into the drain. I didn’t turn the shower on, which would have meant a quick death for him, opting instead to watch this tiny spider fight for his life before eventually drowning in a futile, cruel, watery death. An appropriate metaphor for all existence, I thought.
He came close to getting sucked into the expanding torrent of rushing water; time and time again, he tried to climb up the bathtub sides, before sliding back down, almost getting sucked in, and then fighting for his life again. I sat down on the toilet and watched, sitting in the rising cloud of steam, enveloped in the drone of the faucet’s roar, entranced by this little spider’s perseverance. A minute passed, and still he fought, scrambling his way up and sliding back down, nearly getting pulled in and then escaping blindly, desperately. His struggle seemed valiant, his determination admirable. Still, I waited. Death comes to us all, and a sadistic part of me was rooting for the finality of this tiny creature’s life. I watched, hypnotized by this spider’s unrelenting refusal to give in to death.
“He doesn’t even know why he’s fighting, he just is,” I thought.
Another minute passed, and still he fought.
I reached around and tore off a single square of toilet paper and placed it down near the tiny spider. He immediately climbed onto it as I lifted him up out of the rising tide and set him down on the floor near the tub.
. . . . . .
Prelude was a short story that needed to be less than 400 words (it clocked in at 391).
Prelude
“Christ,” thought Jake. “I’ve never seen so much blood.”
It was impossible to tell how much of it was his. The kitchen was saturated; blood drenched the walls and the window above the sink; it streamed off the counters and down onto the tile, which was an expanding ocean of deep scarlet. Two bodies lay on the floor, like islands, life steadily flowing out of them.
Jake dropped the knife dully and stepped through the kitchen and down the hallway towards the shower. He held the gash in his right side, closing the wound with his fingers, forcing himself not to look down until he had washed himself off. He was wrapped in a warm cocoon of shock; a sweet high whine in his ears, reminding him of honey.
When he reached the bathroom, he turned the shower on full blast. Soon he was standing in a cloud of steam. He carefully peeled off his shirt, still not looking down, and got naked and stepped into the shower. The bottom of the tub was flushed completely red for a moment, then it gradually cleared. The roar of the shower felt good against his head. He closed his eyes and took in a breath.
His thoughts were brilliantly lucid behind his closed eyelids. Sharp images flashed in and out of frame: memories of his childhood, moments of grief and wonder, sensations all set against the backdrop of the knife fight episode only moments earlier. He had reached a new plane of awareness, a kind of mental clarity that he had never before experienced. Adrenaline cascaded through his body; he was aware of each individual beat of his heart; he felt almost enlightened.
Stepping out, he slowly and carefully dried off with a towel, steeling his nerves. Time to survey the damage. He looked down at his right side, just below his ribs, expecting to see his liver bulging out between separated flesh.
There was nothing there.
Confused, he examined his arms, his torso. Nothing. He rushed out into the hall, head spinning, looking for bloodstained footprints leading him back to the kitchen, but he couldn’t see any. He turned the corner to the kitchen where there had been a slaughter, and stopped. The kitchen was spotless, not a hint of blood or damage whatsoever. He stood there in silence.
. . . . . .
The Park was a prose piece.
The Park
The two men walked around the park every Tuesday evening. Not at a leisurely pace, though not rushed either, they walked at a steady, driven momentum as the sun went down behind the mountains. Around and around, the park’s circular cement pathway led them on a familiar trajectory; muscle memory, taking footsteps in healthy strides, moving forward, breathing in the fresh air and talking about literature, film, music, psychology, philosophy, politics, social structures, cultural shifts, girls, old girlfriends, new girlfriends; they talked about work, racism, sex, insights and foresights and hindsights, dreams, goals, family, friends, enemies, life. They covered everything and more, fluidly shifting from one topic to the next with easy and seamless transition.
The landscape was the same each Tuesday: the park was very beautiful. Pine and oak trees rose above them, sometimes completely eclipsing the view of the sky. The smell of the trees and the plants and the freshly cut grass and the wood chips from the park’s playground floor entered their olfactory senses and evoked certain silent memories and past sensations, deeply ingrained in their subconscious. All of this was taken in mindfully through a gradual darkening lens of early evening, then a softer shade of dusk, until finally it was night. And they walked even more, for hours, until the lights of the park finally went out.
. . . . . .
Solitude was another exercise in prose.
Solitude
Marc lived alone in his house. It was a nice four bedroom two bathroom single story home, and he had it all to himself. He had flown out to lay low for a while. This was in the rural and bucolic forest just outside of Durango, Colorado, up north near the ski resort. It resided up a mountain that was completely overtaken by aspen trees; the trees surrounded the house; they seemed to swallow it whole.
There was a kind of rustic quality to the house: a thin layer of dust on the counters, the still mountain air resting inside of the living room, frozen in a picture. The furniture was deep brown worn leather, and the television was huge in the living room, although Marc had never turned it on. It seemed like it would be offensive to turn on the television, it would be disruptive to the quiet solitude that filled the house. The stimulation that would come from the blare of the tv would fuck with the warm and almost sacred frequency of the peace that the woods and the house had created. A bubble on the mountain.
Marc lived alone, and he felt alone. Not lonely—there was a distinction there. A very important distinction. Alone but not lonely. Wasn't that a song lyric from somewhere? Each morning, he'd look in the mirror in the guest bathroom and observe his aging face; he was nearing thirty five, and there was grey hair that was starting to catch and shine in the sunlight. At the right angle, it looked silver. In the wrong angle, he looked older. There was a kind of limbo he faced when he looked in the mirror.
He looked good for his age; he looked good, period. His face had that timeless rugged look to it. Shaved or not, his jaw had a cut; he had a chin. Some guys did not. His eyes, though—that’s where it was at. His eyes were light blue, and while there were the early stages of crows feet (or was that just for women?), his eyes told a story. They were sensitive, they were deep, they were beautiful. This is what he thought of each day as he looked in the mirror, as he looked into himself, before brushing his teeth and starting a pot of coffee. His body had not gone yet; he did pushups and sit ups each day before breakfast, although his frame and physique had started to lag behind; his body was less responsive to exercise. Some days he'd go without eating for the majority of the afternoon -- just coffee and some cigarettes.
Oh, there was that. He smoked. Not much, maybe ten cigarettes a day. Ten too much, sure, but some people smoked two packs a day. Of course, some people smoke crack cocaine and murder children, so maybe let's not compare our lifestyle choices to the rest of the world. This was the internal dialogue that Marc was used to each time he stood out on the porch smoking. It was like a record playing in his head, it was a recorded script that played each time he lit up. Who needs tv when you can listen to the bullshit in your head on repeat? Marc had thrown out the bottles of liquor in the house upon his arrival: he allowed himself cigarettes, and he was trying to ween himself off of those, but the combination of drinking and smoking together would be too much to handle.
He'd never been an alcoholic, although he'd toyed with the possibility. No DUIs or any kind of trouble with drinking. It was just that it was either all or nothing. He never understood the people that could drink one night and then stop for a week. They could take it or leave it. What a foreign concept. When Marc drank, he liked to drink. Hangovers were no stranger to him. There was a kind of nihilistic, hedonistic appeal to waking up hungover in his Los Angeles apartment, walking out on the balcony and lighting up the day's first cigarette, his Ray Bans mercifully protecting his eyes from the harsh glare of the southern California sun.
Drinking aged you. Smoking aged you. But to do both simultaneously was asking for trouble. He had to choose one poison, and he stuck with smoking. Drinking would have to be put on pause.
There was a porch at the house that wrapped around the front, although it remained covered by the roof. In the dense aspen forest, he felt like a dot on a map as he stood out there puffing on his Marlboro reds. Reds: go big or go home. Camels were too smooth, American Spirits were too expensive. Marlboro reds were classic. Cowboy killers, the traditional man's cigarette. Rugged—that was an adjective that he kept coming back to. Looking in the mirror in the mornings, spending his time out in the forest alone, in this rancher's style home, it was, in fact, rugged.
The sounds of nature were constant here: the wind shivering through the trees, the myriad green aspen leaves individually shaking furiously in epileptic spasms, unknown birds singing their own melodies. Marc felt insulated within the vastness of the forest surrounding him. He stayed put silently, day after day, waiting to hear from the Twins, waiting to hear about what had happened with the girl that he had accidentally killed.
. . . . . .
Door was a fun writing experiment. Every night, I brush my teeth and I find myself checking the lock on the bathroom door. The thought of this story had been in my head for a while, and one night I finally wrote it down. I don’t know what’s behind the door. A dream, a memory, trauma, a hallucination . . . interpret it however you will. (Warning: mature language.)
Door: A Short Story
Ever since he was young, Bradley had the habit of always locking the bathroom door. A kind of anxiety had permeated his experiences in bathrooms from a very early age; he was terrified of the door opening while he was in the bathroom. It had become almost like an obsessive compulsive disorder with him. Of course, as a teen, he made sure the bathroom door was locked, for obvious reasons; but even as an adult, there was always a nagging doubt that the door hadn’t been locked.
His girlfriends, he’d had a few, noticed this as well, and they’d say things like “Do you think someone’s going to bust in here or something?” Or “Are you locking yourself in there? What, are you hiding from me?” Still, even though he lived alone in his modern industrial loft apartment, and had lived alone for quite some time, Bradley continued locking the door each time he went to the bathroom.
One night Bradley entered his bathroom and began getting ready for bed. He was brushing his teeth with an electronic toothbrush after having flossed, and he reached down and checked the lock on the door with his left fingers, a kind of ritual he had each time he brushed his teeth: he’d check the lock, and twist the knob to check it. Sure enough, the lock was set (as it was every time), and he turned his attention to his reflection in the mirror as he continued to brush his teeth.
A few seconds later, his right ear picked up a subtle clicking sound. He glanced down at the door handle, and saw it jiggling. It was the twitching, clicking sound that all locked door handles made as you try to twist them open.
Someone was trying to get into his bathroom.
It took a moment to register; the thoughts that ran through his mind in confusion were myriad in a time frame of split seconds, and he mentally went through a litany of possibilities in an instant: Is it Cindy? When’s the last time I talked to her? It’s been months, and she doesn’t know I’m here. No one knows I’m here, I just moved in six months ago.
His mind flashed back to his old childhood house: Is it my family? Am I back home? Are my sisters trying to get in? Am I back in middle school, locking myself in the bathroom and jerking off? Is it some kind of animal? Did I leave the front door open? I’ve never done that before; did someone pick the lock? Did I give someone a key? No. An old girlfriend—older than Cindy. Jesus, I can’t think of anyone. That couldn’t be: I’ve been single for months and no one has been in this apartment yet.
Bradley spit out his toothpaste into the sink and turned off his toothbrush.
“Whoa, hey!” He shouted, placing his hand on the door as the knob continued moving. “Wrong house! Wrong house! This is the wrong apartment, man! What the fuck?!”
The clicking of the knob subsided and there was a moment of stillness, in which Bradley was sure he would hear a man’s voice saying “Oh, shit, sorry man. My bad. I’m looking for (insert name here).” Something like that. But there was only silence.
Then the door started shaking more forcefully, the handle was being wrenched and pulled with even more exertion. Bradley jumped. The knob was working violently, the door was rocking. The torque of the locked handle and the shaking of the jarring door eliminated any woman from Bradley’s mind; it was too strong a force to be a girl.
“Fuck, man!” He shouted, his hand went to the shaking knob and he put his weight against the door. Like being on a bucking bronco, he thought.
“What the fuck is your problem? This is the wrong apartment! Jesus Christ!”
The door handle stopped jiggling, and suddenly there was a thunderous pounding on the door. It was loud and heavy, as though the thing on the other side was throwing its body weight into the door. The blows reverberated through Bradley’s body.
It’s a fucking monster trying to get in.
Bradley’s fevered thoughts raced as his heartbeat pounded machine gun fire in his head. He could taste the toothpaste gritty on his teeth; he hadn’t rinsed.
“Look, asshole!” He screamed. “I have my cell phone in here, and I’m gonna fucking call the cops if you don’t leave right now.”
This was a lie; Bradley’s phone was charging on his night stand, but it was a bluff that he hoped would knock some sense into whoever was on the other side of the bathroom door. There was another settling of silence, it sustained longer this time.
Good, Bradley thought. Get the fuck out of here.
But in an instant the blows started up again, though it sounded different than before. It wasn’t a banging on the door; it was more of a cracking sound. The person on the other side of the door was slamming something into the door handle. It went on for five, six times, steady and slowing down slightly each time, and Bradley heard something drop to the floor. His cell phone slid under the door, the screen had been completely cracked to oblivion; it had blistered open and its electronic guts were visible.
Brad was gripped with a kind of fear that he had never felt in his life. It was a free falling sensation as his thoughts exploded in new revelations.
He’s not in the wrong apartment. He knows where he is, he’s been in my room and he’s seriously trying to hurt me because look at what he did to my cell phone—that was over a thousand dollars—this is like a fucking horror movie; who the fuck is this?!
Silence fell for a moment, as though the person on the other side of the door was waiting for this new development to sink in.
Bradley’s mind continued to race: Is there a window in here? Of course not, I would have noticed that. I couldn’t get out anyways, I’m on the top floor. Let’s see, what do I have in here? Knives, razors, rope? No. Toothpaste, soap, pills, the toothbrush . . .
Bradley reached down and grabbed his electronic toothbrush and held it in his hand like a dagger. He looked around his bathroom with a kind of disorientation, as though he’d never been in it or seen it before. His fear had transmuted itself into high pitched adrenaline that rang in his ears, fluctuating like sharp microphone feedback. He opened his mouth to speak.
“Okay, asshole,” Bradley said, and he was surprised at how controlled and steady his voice was. He had expected a voice of fear to come out of his mouth, maybe cracking in his throat, sounding like a scared little kid. He didn’t sound like that at all. Bradley actually smiled a little, maybe out of reflex—this scenario could just as soon be a comedy if the context were different, he mused.
“I don’t know who you are, but you are going to fucking die if I open this door. You’ve fucked with the wrong guy tonight, and this is your last chance to fuck off!” This sentence ended in a loud shout, and was answered by silence. Bradley held his electronic toothbrush in his right fist, and quietly placed his left hand on the door knob. He gripped the lock on the handle with two fingers and prepared to unlock the doorknob and twist the handle as quickly as he could. Once the door opened, he would stab whoever was out there in the eyeball and dig the toothbrush into his brain.
Bradley counted in his head: one, two . . . three!
He clicked the lock and wrenched the handle and the door flew open.