Another Orphan

I think all writing needs a little love. More than a few tears, blood, and sweat go into the effort of putting the words into something that resembles a story. This is the opening chapter of a story that is some six years old. It hasn't gotten any love or been touched for that length of time. I thought it needed to see a little love. I hope you like it.

Itch

Merlin gave the doorknob a turn and pushed it open for the twenty forth time. Today would be the final day for this job. After what seemed like months, this task had finally come to fruition. He’d practiced and perfected his plan for weeks until he'd become completely confident in his ability. This time tomorrow he’d go for a walk on the beach to celebrate. That’d be a nice reward for a job well done. He closed the door and moved across the thin layer of pea gravel toward the roof’s edge. Over his shoulder, he carried a black nylon silk lined bag.

At the last landing, he’d pulled on his coveralls, nylon gloves, and rubber booties. The gravel crunched and growled beneath his feet, but the result of his foot attire would be no detectable prints on the roof. Merlin came up with the rubber bootie idea, because he didn’t want to leave anything for the police to ponder over and call evidence. He took great strides in his planning to eradicate anything of the sort. He pulled a reed mat out of his bag and unrolled it close to the edge. He lay down on the mat and slowly moved toward the edge of the roof.

He’d have about a quarter of an hour wait, but he wouldn’t be burning up that time smoking. When he started his new profession, he knew that habit would be a liability, so he gave it up. It’d been difficult at first, but when he got the first installment in his bank account, he had no doubt he'd be able to maintain his diligence. So far, he had, and that had been more than five years. Someday when he retired, he might take it up again. He actually liked smoking. At one time, it'd been one of the great joys in his life. Another joy had always been a nice hot cup of coffee. When he really wanted something special, he’d add a shot of Irish whiskey.

After he slipped the rifle out of the bag, he examined it for signs of trauma. Most people didn’t know such a weapon could suffer trauma, but it certainly could. The slightest jolt could upset the alignment and render the most expensive weapon useless. Especially when shooting from extended ranges, a fraction of imperfection at the origin of the shot could result in a miss of several feet. It would be very embarrassing for a paid assassin to call up his handler and try to explain he’d shot the flowerpot instead of the mark because he bumped his weapon while getting into his shooting position.

Today that wouldn’t be a problem. After taking almost ten minutes to slowly and meticulously inspect his weapon he felt satisfied. The L96 looked fine. Earlier, he sighted it in at a vacant pasture in the hills. He couldn’t take the chance of going to a shooting range and having some ambitious cops come asking questions later of the employees. “Sure I remember a guy sighting in his scope on that afternoon.” That’d be the beginning of the end. That’s why he’d developed such an attention to detail. That’s where the devil lived.

Patience, perseverance, and practice were the magical P's that made his profession worthwhile. The money didn’t hurt either. What else paid a quarter of a million dollars for a few days work?

He raised the barrel of the weapon over the lip of the ledge. The image of the empty driveway swam into view inside the scope. For the past twenty-three days, it’d been vacant until approximately five forty five, and that would be in five minutes. Merlin knew the mark had started dutifully making his way into the killing zone. He knew this because the mark had developed a routine that he adhered to with the utmost vehemence. Merlin knew other people like the mark, and they all loved being able to walk away from the daily grind of life and step into a world they'd created for themselves. It always proved to be a place that pleased and soothed them and in turn gave them the courage and strength to make it through one more day.

Merlin gently placed the gun on the mat and picked up his compact binoculars. He looked up the street and then down. He wasn’t looking for anything, in particular, but then again, he was. He looked for anything that didn’t belong. An oddity that set itself apart from anything that he'd seen in the past three weeks. The low probability of seeing something out of the ordinary did not diminish his need to search. He didn’t want to realize later handcuffed in the back of a patrol car that the scene had been screaming for him to forget his task and just get out. Right now, he hadn’t really broken any laws here, but when he loaded and fired his gun, he’d become the prey. He believed his attention to this detail would benefit him in the hunt to follow. One he intended to last for a very long time.

The sky overhead exhibited a brilliant blue with nary a cloud anywhere. Any wind had been virtually non-existent for the last few days, and the weather radio station had alluded to the possibility of a stagnant air warning if the situation did not change. Perfect conditions for his eight hundred and fifty five meter shot prevailed. After he completed this job he could tell his handler, who called himself Gandalf, never to second guess his decisions again. The guy had been pushing him to finish the job for almost a week now, but Merlin told him he’d finish it when he felt ready and not a minute sooner. Gandalf didn't like that, but that’s the way he did things. No one would ever tell him when to pull the trigger. He had the patience necessary to complete a perfect job. He’d never decide to finish a job until its completion would be a thing of beauty.

The afternoon sun had started to set behind him and the long thin shadow of the building he'd stationed himself atop silently crawled over the distance and approached the empty driveway. If, for some reason, the mark looked toward the rooftop upon which he waited, his eyes would look directly into the evening sun. Merlin planned this as well. He didn’t want anything to go wrong with this job. For no reason other than he considered it a high profile hit. The mark had simply become an itch to someone who would pay to have it permanently scratched. Merlin knew all too well that tomorrow every cop in the city would be working overtime to find him. He paused and gave his situation one last consideration.

    Everything felt right. The time to finish what he’d started had come. He pulled out a box from the bag and removed a single bullet from inside. He looked at the shiny object that seemed to glow in the reddish light of the afternoon sun. He put it to his lips and kissed it softly then placed it into the open gun chamber. He closed the bolt and sent the bullet into the firing position. He looked at his watch.

    “Time for the final act to begin,” Merlin said to himself in a barely audible whisper. He looked again over the edge of the ledge at the empty driveway. “Now cooperate with me and don’t make me wait. I’ve got a TV dinner in the oven at home, and it’s getting cold.”

The Zone

“You're traveling through another dimension, a dimension not only of sight and sound but of mind; a journey into a wondrous land whose boundaries are that of imagination. That's the signpost up ahead—your next stop, the Twilight Zone.”


—Rod Serling


I was thinking about these words the other day. They were one of the introductions to my all-time favorite TV show. If you’ve never seen any of the episodes, then you have missed some really terrific writing. As in anything some of the episodes were better than others, but as a whole, the show stretched the boundaries of sixties TV.


Even so, I have no intention of praising that show here in this post. What I would like to embellish on is Rod Serling’s words. For the last two years, I’ve enjoyed taking part in the National Novel Writing Month held every year in November. If you are so inclined you can find more information at nanowrimo.org


The catch line for the challenge is: “Thirty days and nights of literary abandon." In my opinion, this is absolutely correct. When you’re attempting to put 50,000 plus words into a story, there isn’t time to think about what you’re writing. So it is very liberating for a writer’s muse to take hold of a story and run. That’s what I try to do. If the story isn’t completely concrete, I’ll have time to flesh it out after the 30th. The important thing is to get those words out of my head onto the paper or into the computer.

So with November 1st fast approaching, I see a signpost up ahead. In fact, for me, there are two.

The first image that comes to mind is the tunnel sign. For me, November is like traveling through a tunnel. There is a beginning, a middle, and an end. At the onset, the light at the end of the tunnel is obscured by the Everest of words I’ll need to churn out as fast as possible, so I can keep the story fresh in my mind. The focus is on that story and those words that will tell the story.

The second is the caution sign. I don’t want to spend my entire month focused on this challenge. Let’s face it November is a time for celebrations and holiday prep. The last thing anyone needs to do is shirk those challenges to sit in front of a computer screen with some background music blaring as white noise. I plan to proceed with caution and schedule at least three hours a day to reach my daily goal of 1667 words. Those hours may be early or late but I'll need to make them count.

When midnight on the last day of November arrives, I plan to look at another completed story. Oh sure it’ll take some rewriting and some editing to make it shine, but that magical muse will have done his work, and I’m sure he’ll want a few days off. He always asks for Christmas.

If you join us in nanoland this year, you will enter another dimension. Not one of sight and sound but of mind. You’ll journey into a wondrous land whose boundaries are that of imagination. If you should need a guide or a writing buddy search for rc022762. See you there.

Octoberfest

October, the harbinger, has finally arrived with a basket filled with pre-holiday forebodings and sharpened tools of harvest. It seems as if yesterday the lazy days of summer pressed down upon us with the heat of canicular days bursting with abundant sunlight. Every so slowly Old Sol has trekked on to a new path leaving us northerners for the belly dwellers of the earth. Our days have shortened and made way for a show of varying shades of orange, gold, purple, and red. We can stand back and be amazed as we witness nature’s own brilliant color display. It is wonderful how each year goes out in a blaze of brilliance.

Fall is upon us and with it, the closing of another year fast approaches. The favorites of Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Years Eve peek laughingly at as from the shadows that linger along the edges of the road. Three-quarters of 2012 lay behind us and the light we see at the end of the path is the year 2013 hastening toward its birth. Over the next three months, we’ll all remark how short the time seems and wonder how we’ll manage to perform the mountain of tasks that stand between us and a new year.

Somehow I’m sure we’ll manage just as we always do. At the end of this month, we’ll pass out candies and treats to little ghouls that walk our streets every other day masquerading as adorable children. Three weeks later we’ll load up our tables with a feast fit for any kingdom, and celebrate our year giving thanks for how far we have come. Then on the day after we’ll rush out with a list of tasks into the senescent remains of 2012 determined to be triumphant, and we’ll either succeed or submit but either way we will declare victory. After Christmas comes the winding down. Not only for the year that lay behind us, but for ourselves in preparation for the last hurrah on New Year’s Eve. Hours will tick away into minutes, then seconds, and at last we’ll kiss and sing as we welcome the fresh New Year. All the time of 2012 will have evaporated, and we’ll have only the memories we choose to store within our heart.

On New Year’s Day, we’ll arise to look at the path set before us and survey the 365 steps we have yet to take, and we’ll vow to make 2013 better for us in some amazing way. It’s out there waiting for us like a virgin field of untracked snow. A white pristine fresh canvas waiting for us to paint the scene, and it will become whatever we choose from our hearts and minds. We can start sketching it out now. Get a feel for what it’s going to be and how we’re going to make it happen. Then when we step up to that unmarred year, we’ll be ready to make of it whatever we want it to be. Think of the possibilities.