I was Managing Editor for several issues of the Inland Northwest Catalyst business magazine.
I reworked the style guide for the magazine to entice more advertisers, and also wrote for the magazine. Below is my first issue and the cover story I wrote.
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I created a reoccurring column at the Catalyst about entrepreneurs in the Inland Northwest.
This article is one of them.
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Excerpt from a script of a show I produced and wrote for the popular Modern Marvels series produced by Actuality for History Channel.
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This story I wrote has appeared on Scribed, Helium and Textnovel.
JUST MAYBE. © A Short Story
“Gawd d_mmit, I told you, you’re not going anywhere tonight.” As the father stormed inside, he threw his cigarette down still burning, into the dead potted plant on the patio. It bounced down next to the others burnt down to their filters. Did he always storm out on conversations? Is that why he never bothered to put out a cigarette, the son wondered? The father certainly stormed out on most of his.
Maybe he threw them down without putting them out so the mother wouldn’t complain at the little black charcoaled patched they’d make on her pristine patio. Maybe one day the father would throw one in the dying ivy that climbed the wooden-shake house and set it on fire. The son laughed out loud.
“F__ker,” he said.
The son threw his own cigarette out, father style into that ivy. Just maybe.
The son walked in the house.
“I’m going,” he said.
The father slammed down his drink for effect the way he always did when he was mad, which was quite often.
“I said you’re not going anywhere, and I meant it.”
“Oh yes I am, and you can’t stop me.”
“Don’t make me get the belt!”
“Go ahead, I’m going anyway.”
The father leapt deftly out of his favorite chair, drink in hand sloshing furiously. He landed right in the son’s face. How many times had this happened before? The stare down. The father knew exactly how far to jump in order to land right in the son’s space and the son knew exactly how long to stand there enduring. At least this kept the old man from getting the belt.
“You’re not going and that’s final!” he screamed at the top of his lungs.
The son felt the spit spew onto his face and the familiar smell of whiskey about him.
“Fine!” the son screamed back. “You old f__k!” he added as he bolted for his room down the hall, the father directly behind.
The son just made it to his room as the father reached out to grab him by the collar. The door slammed shut and the father’s hand smashed against the door.
“You little piece of sh_t!” the father screamed.
“F__k you,” the son said defiantly, now protected by the closed door.
The father pounded on the door once for effect and stormed down the hall to his favorite chair murmuring under his breath the whole way.
“Boys, boys,” the mother demurely purred from the kitchen as if on cue, “have a heart.”
Did she always wait until the fight had properly subsided before pretending to break it up? She had to be on antidepressants; how else could she stand this constant chaos?
“Dinner’s ready,” she added with that familiar uneasy smile.
The father sat down to eat, more irritated that the food wasn’t immediately on the plate than that his heart rate was through the roof. He was not at all hungry.
“Honey,” the mother calmly called down the hall to the son. “Dinner’s ready.”
“Make me another drink,” the father demanded to the mother.
“Yes dear.” She poured him extra hoping to calm him down.
The father started eating as soon as the food was placed before him. He never looked up or said anything to his wife. When had it gotten so bad? How many years had they done this? It was a long running play. Could it be different? Just maybe.
The mother went to talk to the son and he reluctantly emerged from his room. He sat down at the table with a sigh, openly displaying his hostility. The father seethed. The mother sat examining her food thinking of what light topic of conversation to bring up.
“You know it’s going to rain,” the mother started.
No one said anything.
“I’m not sittin’ in my room all night,” stated the son.
“I don’t give a good gawdd__m where you sit but your butt’s not leaving this house.”
Under the son’s breath, “It is too.”
“What did you say!?”
“Nothin’”
“No, what did you say?”
The mother stared at her plate.
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You’re not going anywhere and that’s final!” Silence.
“Am too,” the son whispered.
The dad stood up, chair flying backward. He slammed his fist on the table, of course missing the table and landing on the edge of his plate, sending the canned peas and carrots flying. This had happened too. How many times had the food flown? Flying food. Fairly common.
The mother got up instinctively to begin the clean up. The son jumped up in a defensive stance. “Get to your room NOW!”
“NO”
“NOW!”
“NO”
Before the blink of an eye the whole table was flying through the air. Had the flying table ever happened? At least not in recent memory. The wife jumped back and started making weird wailing noises, the kind of strange sounds one utters when all control is lost. The father grabbed the son by the neck. The son punched the father in the face. It must have stung. The father punched the son in the stomach. Could it get worse? Just maybe.
The son ran to his room and slammed the door. The father screamed that all hell should reign down upon the son. The mother wailed. The father drank. The son cried.
The mother and father fell asleep far apart in the bed, the father snoring loudly, cigarette still burning in the bedside ashtray, half-finished drink next to it. The last ice-cube melted in the alcohol. The house was quiet.
The son made his move, stealing out of his room and down the hall to the kitchen. Creak. That damn wooden floor. Creak. Sh_t. He poured himself a drink of his father’s whiskey before leaving. The kitchen was dark. The drink was good. He stood there quietly staring out the kitchen window dreaming what life might be like without this chaos. It started to rain.
The ice in the whiskey glass popped. The hammer on the shotgun cocked. The son spun around in the dark. The barrel pointed right at his heart.
Did the father know it wasn’t a thief? Just maybe.
