Temple

Fiction. I’m actually kind of proud of this one.

Temple

There was the woods. There was overcast sky. There was Cade and there was Temple. It was humid and they walked.

“For every single thing you see you think is ‘beautiful’ or ‘striking’ or ‘takes your breath away’ there’s something within twenty feet of it that’s disgusting.”

“Shut up, you’re ruining this.”

“I’m not ruining anything, it’s all already ruined. Why did you want to come up here anyway, all anyone ever did was come up here to have sex.”

“It’s nice up here. Can’t you just this once not actively try and ruin our walk? We haven’t done this since high school and you still can’t help but ruin it.”

“See that majestic oak, some asshole couple came, probably had sex against the tree, and then carved their names into it. Like three months later, I bet they broke up and hated each other. The tree doesn’t know that, but it still has to deal with ‘BARRY + BARBARA 4EVER’ carved into its trunk.”

“Maybe they got married, and they still visit this tree and make love and reminisce about it.”

“No one makes love anymore.”

“Yes they do, I bet a ton of people do. I would, with the right person.”

Temple scoffed.

“Nope, people fuck, screw, bone, pork, and rut. They don’t make love. Making love is something movie people do.”

“Movie people? You mean characters in movies.”

“Whatever. I don’t care,” She paused. “There’s a condom on that rock.”

“That’s disgusting, Temple.”

The trail steepened. Temple climbed in front and hopped from rock to rock. Cade followed her and considered each step. Temple was taking the big loping vertical steps that happen just before you start climbing on all fours.

“Empty beer can. Another condom. Sock. Hmm, someone fucked their way up this mountain.”

Cade winced. “It’s hardly a mountain, especially compared to what we have back west. This here is at best an italicized hill.”

“Italicized hill, huh? I like that. That fancy university learnin’ is doing something for you.”

She stopped climbing, and looked over her shoulder at Cade.

“Ya know Cade, if you weren’t such a pussy I might have actually fucked you in high school.”

Cade stumbled, regained his footing and looked up at Temple. She was grinning.

“You waited until I was mid-step to say that, didn’t you?”

“Yea, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t mean it.”

“Really, though, would you have?”

“I don’t know, maybe. Definitely not if all you did was make love.”

“Well, I mean, for you, I’d have made an exception.”

“You’re saying you’d have fucked me, for me?”

“Yea, I guess.”

The trail got rougher still, and the two climbed for a while in silence, except for their own panting sighs and the sounds of the woods. Cade began putting trash he found in his backpack.

“Why are you doing that?”

“It doesn’t belong here.”

“Neither do we, really.”

“Yea, but we can walk out.”

“Hopefully.”

A sizable rock Temple stepped on dislodged itself and tumbled past Cade. He scrambled out of the way.

“You’re throwing rocks at me. The one trying to clean this place up gets rocks thrown at him.”

“Yep, I should probably tell you I plan on pushing you off this thing once we get up there too.”

“Well, if that’s the case, let me get a last meal in. What do we have to eat?”

“Uh, water.”

“Cool, pull over here.”

“Who’s driving?”

“What?”

“You said ‘pull over here’ like we’re driving somewhere.”

“Oh, no I just meant we should stop on this rock.”

“So why not say what you mean?”

“It’s an expression, I was being creative with my speech. Like you always say what you mean, Temple.”

They stopped and split a canteen. Both winded, they swallowed until they couldn’t breath and handed the canteen to the other.

Cade smirked. “So, why didn’t you ever do me in high school again? You pretty much fucked everyone else.”

“Fuck you.”

“It’s not like it’s an exaggeration.”

“Yea well, I was an ‘angsty-troubled-teen-who-exhibited-textbook-approval-seeking-behavior’.”

“Is that the excuse you used on the entire football team, or just your therapist?”

“Stop. You’re just bitter.”

“Bitter? No.”

“Liar. You were in love with me. Don’t think I didn’t know it.”

“I wasn’t in love with you.”

“You were. You were, and it was pathetic Cade.”

“Oh.”

Cade looked a long time before saying anything at all. “Why everyone else but me?”

“I don’t know. I just didn’t want to then.”

“So, what do we do now. Make sweet, passionate love and call it even?” Cade half-smirked.

Temple looked away from Cade and towards the ground.

“No, Cade. We won’t be making love any time soon.”

“I was only joking Temple. Can we just keep climbing?”

Cade got up and started walking. His eyes lingered on the odd piece of trash, but he left it all where it lay.

They reached the top. They looked out on what was the town they grew up in and all either of them saw was a brown blotch surrounded by green. Electric poles peaked over trees. They were not high up. The view was stark.

“Have you had any girlfriend’s yet in college Cade?”

“Uh, I don’t know. You know how it is. I’ve made a ton of friends, it’s great. I have to find a girl eventually.”

“Yea, that sounds about right.”

“Why do you ask?”

“I just needed to know.”

They sat and hung their legs over the edge. Cade told Temple why he’d brought her here and Temple already knew. They kissed and Temple already knew what was going to happen, she kept her arms to her side and let him do what he wanted.

“You said we wouldn’t.”

“I know.”

They left the backpack open. Some trash rolled out and the wind took it over the edge.

– – –

The walk down was silent.

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Happy St. Patrick’s Day.  I have a tumblr now, and I’d love for you readers to follow me, I will return the gesture in kind.

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Fired

First new fiction in a while.  I kind of hate this piece after looking at it so much.  Still a work in progress.

Fired

Alex showered for five and half minutes, brushed every tooth, flossed, and measured out the mouthwash to the perfect recommended amount.

He dug through his drawers until he found an old, worn flip top lighter. He put on a shirt, a pair of pants and the tie he kept in a permanent Double Windsor. The tie was almost black, but for the diagonal charcoal-colored stripes.

Alex drew his breath in as he rounded the corner to his living room. His mother sat in the chair she never left with the same glaucoma-clouded gaze she had the morning before. Alex saw her and let out a sigh. She continued to stare at the TV as if Alex had never entered the room. Alex stared at her and said he was going to work. He said he wasn’t sure if he’d be home tonight. He said he was going to meet his girl. The TV blared.

Alex walked out his house and into his garage. He pulled to the end of the driveway and saw his mailbox full of messages from his girl. He smiled to himself. His shift started in fifteen minutes.

Alex drove to work. He thought of living in his own apartment. He thought of his girl. She was a couple inches shorter than him, a brunette and spoke a different language. He thought of what her tongue and lips felt like. He thought of having sex with her. He imagined pinning her against a wall and both of them climaxing at the same time. He struggled to keep his car straight as he saw himself fucking her at every conceivable angle. He parked in his usual spot. He hid his erection with his briefcase as he walked to his cubicle. He was late.

Alex stared at his computer screen for an hour. He began chewing a piece of gum. He played Solitaire for an hour. He took his fifteen minute break early and spent it masturbating in the janitor’s closet to the unfinished thoughts he’d had on the ride over. The noises he made as he came were hollow. He stood with his eyes closed, panting. A dim light entered the closet through a small eye level window. His semen dripped onto a bottle of turpentine. The bottle was three-quarters full, had a green cap, and was covered in markings meant to tell parents it would kill their babies if they drank it. He stared at it. He knelt down without pulling up his pants or underwear, undid the cap and stood back up. A drop of Alex landed in the bottle. The milky white mixed with the urine-colored fluid and disappeared. The closet smelled like pine cones now. Alex’s mouth twitched upward. He pulled his pants back up.

His cubicle was one of a dozen sets of four which made up the office floor. The opening to his cubicle faced into the aisle, into the opening of another cubicle. There were pictures of distant relatives fastened to the fiberglass and cardboard walls with colored tacks. Alex’s coworker looked at them when he wanted to feel someone loved him. There were constantly smiling bobble-heads Alex’s coworker periodically tapped. The rhythmic shaking reminded him he was in control. Alex’s eyes lingered on the framed motivational poster his coworker had decided to devote a wall to. It was a close-up of a lit match held by a calloused hand with the word “Passion” underneath it.

Alex did his job. Mail the company received went in one pile and mail it was sending out went into the other pile. Alex worked for a company hired out by larger companies to send out all their catalogs and advertisements. Alex chewed his gum and sorted junk mail. When the gum lost its flavor, Alex took it out of his mouth with his hand and went to stick it underneath his desk. His hand felt for a spot without a hardened mass of gum already stuck to it. It was all his gum. He couldn’t find a spot so he put the gum back in his mouth. Alex frowned. There were three hours left in his shift.

Alex finished his work. He stared at his coworker’s poster, at the match. He smiled at first. There were two hours left in his shift.

His gum had lost all its flavor. He reached in his pocket for another piece, the package was empty. He tossed his gum out. He’d have to get a new pack or he’d start getting cravings again. Everyone told him it was bad for him, but he liked it. It made him feel cool, despite everything. There was an hour left in his shift. He thought about meeting his girl again, it was a few hours away. His shift was over in thirty minutes.

The office was empty. His shift ended an hour ago. He was at his desk. The building was dark.

His shift ended three hours ago. Alex opened his briefcase. He shifted around the papers covering the bottle of wine. It was half empty. He set it on his desk. He slid the thin candles out of the pencil holders in his suitcase lid. He opened the bottom drawer of his desk and pulled out the two candle holders he kept there. They were the only things in the drawer. He ran his fingers through his hair. He fiddled with his charcoal tie. He pulled at the collar of his shirt and made sure his tie was on straight. He couldn’t take it off without messing it up, so he tightened it. His tie was choking him now.

He sat straight up in his chair. His head hurt from lack of nicotine. His left hand gripped the bottle of wine at the neck. His right hand dangled at his side. His shift ended six hours ago.

His head hurt and the bottle was almost empty. He lit the candles with the cigarette lighter he still kept in his pocket. Seven hours.

He took his head off of his desk and checked his watch. It was four thirty in the morning. It was almost time. He hoped this wouldn’t be like all the other times, this time he’d put more effort in to everything. He got her wine which means he had to say something.

The bottle was in his left hand. He stood in the building’s mail room. There was a large garage door for the deliveries that arrived on weekends. There was a small door next to that for the daily delivery. On the walls were the boxes labeled with the names of each employee. These were the boxes where Alex placed the mail he’d sorted in at the end of each work day. Alex’s box was somewhere in the middle. Alex switched the bottle from hand to hand. He kept it in his left He looked at his watch. It was three minutes past five.

She arrived at seven minutes past five, right when she always did. He first met her when he came in to work early, and forgot his key. She let him in using the key the building owner had given her to make deliveries. She smiled at him, she was so nice. Since then, he watched her from the window in the janitor’s closet. She came on Monday and Friday mornings, he always stayed at work for her. One time she looked up and caught him staring, she smiled at him again, that was the first time he’d masturbated in the closet.

“Hello.”

She held the letters outward and tried to smile. He fumbled with something on the other side of the door with his left hand. He reached out and took the letters, his hand shook.

He forced the words out. “I’m Alex.”

He stared at her. His hand trembled.

“No understand English, sir.”

“Please come in.”

“No entiendo.”

“You speak Spanish?”

“No entiendo.”

He stumbled forward. She took a step away and looked around, she saw the bottle of wine he was holding. He swung his arm around and the wine sloshed in the bottle.

“I got the wine for us. I even lit candles inside. We’ll just have a drink and talk. You let me in. You smiled at me. You’re a very nice person.”

She began to back away, he was confused. He knew he loved her. She must just be shy. He’d take care of her.

“Please don’t go. I’m sorry.”

She turned and walked back to her car.

“Wait.”

Alex closed the door. He finished the bottle and went back to his desk. He cried. His shift started in three hours.

He looked over at the poster. He saw the word printed on it. He looked at the empty bottle. He looked at the flame of the candles. He felt the gum under his desk. His eyes widened. He grabbed the bottle and got up from his chair. His shift started in two and a half hours.

He went to the janitor’s closet. He filled the wine bottle until it was half full with turpentine. The room smelled like him. He gagged. He shuddered and went back to his desk. His shift started in two hours.

He sat down in his chair. He took off his charcoal tie and shoved it into the open bottle. His neck felt better. He started to sweat. His shift started in an hour and a half.

Alex lit the end of his tie with the candle. It burned faster than he thought it would. He got up from his chair and held the cocktail in his left hand. He looked at his reflection in the glass bottle. His left arm shook. He dropped the bottle.

The bottle made a soft thump as it hit the carpet. It did not break. Alex stamped out his charcoal tie. He picked up the bottle and threw it in the trash. He slumped into his chair. His shift started in an hour.

Alex put the candle holders back inside his desk. He sat up in his chair and wiped his face. He took the poster off the wall and placed it flat over the top of the small garbage pail inside his cubicle. His shift started in thirty minutes.

His boss walked in.

“Hey Alex, you’re early. Forgot your tie tho.”

Alex nodded without looking up at him.

“Don’t worry about it, it’s Friday after all.”

His boss patted him on the back. Alex nodded and smiled.

“Keep up the good work.”

Alex’s shift started.