A quarter-eaten sandwich laid on the desk in the corner, the halogens giving the remains of the triangle cut pieces of bread a blue hue. Mr. Michaels was not expecting to get back to his dinner anytime soon. Eleven years as a Medical Examiner and he still could never bring himself to eat after a particularly gruesome autopsy.
“Where do you want the first one?” the EMT push a single stretcher through the stainless steel door at the end of the room. A white plastic, zipped body bag gliding silently past rows of examination tables toward Mr. Michaels, his appetite waning.
“Right here. They said on the phone… Is it really that bad?”
The EMT stopped by the selected table, his pale face looking silently at the M.E. “Whatever it was, it got the whole family. And it’s still out there somewhere.”
Together they shifted the bag from the stretcher and onto the exam table. “Don’t you mean ‘whoever?’” Mr. Michaels asked. “You said ‘whatever.’ Don’t you mean ‘whoever?’”
The EMT rested his hands on the cool metal of the stretcher’s bars, his pale face again fixed seriously on the M.E. with more poignant silence. “Sure.”
The wheels of the stretcher, empty of the weight that brought them into the room, squeaked their high-pitched farewell as the EMT pushed them from the room. More men with more bags made their way into the room and Mr. Michaels absentmindedly directed them to tables. His full focus turned to the zipped metal teeth in front of him, sealing both side of the bag rigor-mortised along the table.
His cold thumb and index finger grasped the colder metal and pulled, letting the darkness inside spill out against the white vinyl, a long dark line running the length of the bag. Mr. Michael’s hands spread the open sides of the bag. Widening the gap.
**********************************************************************
David sat in the back row of the church. Churches made him nervous. The hard pews, the overly thin paper of their Bibles. The rules and traditions. Everyone moving in unison. The stares.
A single, giant, family portrait of the Gibbsons stood on an easel at the front next to large vases of arranged flowers. The Gibbsons being prominent members of the church, the turnout was favorable. Black cotton clothing filled pew after pew, the appropriate amount of sniffles and heads hung low joining the fabric in their statements of mourning.
David watched them. They gnawed on bread and knelt on folding benches. Moved their hands and sung their hymns. They dabbed their tissues and held their children. Stared at the photo, and at the five wooden caskets arraigned behind the man who chanted. Together they mourned appropriately, asking no questions and thinking only of the happy lives that lead up to the events of today. It was a closed casket ceremony.
*********************************************************************
“Eric,” David picked up his pace, moving across the green lawn and loosening his tie. The church behind him spewing out mourners. “I didn’t see you inside?”
Eric stood next to his squad car, ready but reluctant to leave. “I was in the front lobby. I never know if it’s appropriate for me to come to these things.”
David sent a knowing look. “Did you guys find out anything? I mean, with the autopsy?”
“Look, David–”
“I know, you’re the one with the badge.” David unbuttoned his collar. “Eric. It’s me.”
Eric thought for a moment.
“Did you guys at least find it? Whatever it was?”
“There’s been no other attacks. There was no trails. No solid evidence in the house.”
“What about the autopsy?”
Eric paused again, watching the mourners mill about the lawn, the white steeple stuck against the green grass. “Give you a ride home?”
**********************************************************************
Ever since the colored people had made this town their home, Russell McKinney had become an angry man. Not long after that, the Asians and Mexicans came, and purely by coincidence, Russell’s anger grew.
From the stool where he sat, this town was all downhill.
“What’s she doing here?” Russell asked, sulking into his coffee. His head began to ache.
“I work here Mr. McKinney, you know that.” Jennifer’s dark mouth moved politely, as her hands tied an apron around her waist.
Russell pushed the mug away, sliding it across the counter. “Keep the change.” He placed a five dollar bill on the laminate countertop, swiveled his stool around and pushed his way through the glass door with an abrupt dong.
His head thumped. The stress or the coffee. He could never tell.
Shuffling his feet along the broken asphalt, he made his way up the alley beside the small diner. The last of few places in town he didn’t mind spending money. His pickup truck was parked a few feet away, cool in the shadows of the space between buildings. With each step the pound of his headache became more and more intense. His truck multiplied, as he grasped his temples and staggered.
“rrrrrrrrrrrrr….”
Russell staggered around, looking for the source of the growl. Probably some stupid animal. It sounded close. If he was lucky, he thought he could hit it with his truck. Despite his sudden delirium. He’d driven with worse.
The entrance of the alley was empty. Brick to brick from left to right.
“RRRRRRRRR!”
Russell turned again, facing his truck. The pain grew. Veins pumped and his breaths shortened, teeth clenched. He pressed on his head, tears streamed from his eyes as mucus pulsed from his nose and mouth. He couldn’t sob, couldn’t yell. He tasted blood. He fell to his knees, hard against the cement. Another low, firm growl filled his ears. It was close.
***********************************************************************
Eric and David sat in the police car outside David’s home. The chaos at the Gibbson’s house a memory.
“Clawed?”
“The whole family. The kids. Mr. Gibbson. All… mauled. Claw marks and teeth marks. We had a hard enough time just figuring out who was who. They were all…attacked. Everyone except Mrs. Gibbson.” Eric looked into his hands, folded into each other.
“What happened to Mrs. Gibbson?” David reluctantly let the words slip from his lips.
“Her head. It… It–was torn open.”
The two men looked at each other, searching for understanding.
“Whatever it was–whatever killed that family, it’s like it came from her. Inside of her.”
David turned, processing the sentence sitting in the front seat with them. He stared at the open window of the Gibbson’s house. “Lovely.”
Comments 1
Yay! Chapter Two!
Section 1
P1: Try: “A quarter-eaten sandwich lay on the desk in the corner, its triangle cut remains tinged blue by halogen lights.” (In the original sentence, too many “the”s, wrong form of “lie”, unnecessary “ing”s.) “was not expecting” could become “did not expect” to keep the tense active. Not sure if “medical examiner” needs capitalization in this instance, but could be.
P2: Should be “pushed”. Also, I’ve checked on it: white body bags are becoming increasingly popular, so that’s fine. “Glided”. Suggestion: “Appetite on the wane.”
P3: “pale face studying the M.E.”—it says “looking silently” and then immediately, he begins to talk.
P4: “ ‘Don’t you mean, ‘whoever’?’” is stated twice.
P5: The EMT’s face is already described as pale. Pick something new for the second go round. I’ll continue my piece on the silence/immediate talky thing: How about he falls momentarily silent? Give the silence a time limit, and you clear the problem up.
P6: “the room” stated twice in the same sentence. On occasion, phrases and words can be repeated; here, however, it sounds awkward. “sides”. “rigor mortis-bound bag” sounds better to me.
P7: I don’t particularly like the feel of that final sentence as a fragment, but it does heighten the drama.
Overall: Good details worked in, encompassing touch, sight, and sound (pleeeease don’t ever go into taste here in this section, or I might throw up).
Section 2
P1: Substitute “too” for “overly”? Maybe eliminate the “The” in front of “Rules and traditions.”
P2: “Number instead of “amount”?
P3: “arraigned”? I assume you meant “arranged”, since I doubt the coffins are accused of a crime here. I’d make that last line its own paragraph. It’s too awesome for anything less.
Section 3
P1: “spewed”. Like the image of David crossing the lawn. But is that final question really a question? It feels more like a statement to me.
P2: “Stood beside”. You used “next to” a few paragraphs earlier, and its nice to mix things up.
P3: I’m not sure if “knowing look” is the appropriate action here. Perhaps “probing/inquiring” or something completely different?
P5: “It’s me”…but why would that matter to a police officer? Do they know each other at all outside of the whole “domestic streaker” thing? If so, at this point in the story, the reader should probably know about it.
P8: “Were no other” not “was”. And evidence of what?
P9: Maybe a different word than “stuck”. Stark/pronounced? Side note: Eric assumes David walked to church? Doesn’t necessarily need to be addressed, but think on it.
Section 4
P1: “Ever” not “even”. Yep, *totally* by coincidence. This monster-thing seems really out to get mean and unhappy characters.
P2: The town is all downhill from his stool…I kind of like that image.
P5: Excellent section with attention to detail.
P7: Add a “the” in front of “few”; it sounds a bit off as it stands.
P9: He wants to *hit* it?! Without knowing what it is? Grrr…Go beast go!
P10: “Brick to brick from left to right”—nice.
P12: Intriguing. No clear idea what’s going on here, but that, I think, is how it should be.
Section 5
P1: Connect the two sentences with a comma.
P3: Size wasn’t an indication on who was who? Also there are two “into”s in that last sentence.
P4: Good accompanying action with the dialogue.
P7: Wait, what?! Creepy creepy creepy.
P8: Nifty bit of personification. And that last bit of dialogue? Wonderful. Totally awesome reaction.
Final Comments:
Posted 05 Mar 2010 at 12:06 pm ¶-Yes, there is a time and a place for “ing” verbs. Sometimes they really help a sentence out. But you should still work on watching these. The beginning section carried the brunt of these, and got much better at the end.
-Thus far, Eric is my favorite character. Not sure why yet. David, however, has grown on me after that “lovely” comment.
-So…what the heck exploded from Mrs. Gibbon’s head? Because I really really want to know.
Trackbacks & Pingbacks 1
[...] Ch. 2- Growl [...]
Post a Comment