Part I

Note: This is two for the price of one.


Paris.

Aemilia Prior had a sneaking suspicion that this was not her life. She sat at a table for two with her forearms pressed against the top and hands laced easily together. Across from her, inside the modest red-tiled kitchen, Adam Baptiste attempted to drain water from spaghetti noodles. Steam rose from the metal colander and fogged his glasses. He was blinded. She could not see the shape of his pale hazel eyes; only their marbled brown-green color. When he grunted and pushed black frames up his forehead, she laughed into the hands that were brought up to her crooked grin.

"Don't laugh. I still have that picture of the fat pony that you drew," he mumbled into the roar of the faucet. He drenched the noodles with cold water to separate them. She let him and peered around the apartment for sign of the sketch. He had threatened to frame the childish scrawl of limbs attached to a round body. A horse.

His flat was a riot of spilling loose leaf and canvas bolts. Large prints of Basquiat and Haring decorated his walls. An easel sat wedged in front of the narrow door that led out to a welcome-mat sized patio. It was winter and snow had piled up on all the windowsills. It was too cold to paint outside. Everything smelled like turpentine and paint, dust and paper. They were all familiar, good smells. It was one of the reasons why she could come over. It reminded her of home.

He did not. Adam was an inverse with his coffee-with-milk skin and hair twisted into tiny dreadlocks. He was bohemian and ratty in a stretched out oatmeal cardigan spotted with ink and paint on the large square pockets. His jeans were a tragedy. His feet were bare. When he grinned, his teeth were impossibly white and straight. He had his French father's sharp features and the full mouth of a Nigerian mother. He laughed without reason. A happy man. No shadows or torment. Hands were capable as he stirred the marinara sauce with a wooden spoon.

"What are you thinking?"

Her head snapped back to face him and she shrugged. Fingers nudged at the messy knot of her hair. They pulled out the curled strands of hair that itched at the nape of her neck. "I don't know. Nothing at all, I suppose."

"You looked very far away."

"Maybe I was," she said with a tilt of her mouth. The line of her upturned nose wrinkled.

"Wine?"

"Oui."

"In the fridge," he said with a thumb nudging to the small icebox behind him.

Aemilia lifted from her coiled spot on the chair and padded across creaking floorboards into the cold press of tiles. Her toes curled up in chilled shock. She grabbed the wine off the lighted shelf and brought it over to the cabinet. The drawer beneath was pulled open and she lifted out the silver bottle-opener. The corkscrew was coaxed out from the pocketknife compactness of the opener. She stabbed metal into the stopper.

"Benoit called. He is putting together an exhibit of 'Young Paris' and he wants me to put some stuff in. Apparently, our shabby-chic is all the rage," he snorted with a shake of his head. "It is terrible that my poverty sits in other people's mansions."

"When you have wine, how can you be poor?" The label was cheap, but good. She sloshed wine into a set of glasses and held up one for him to take. Her cheek pressed up into the pucker of lips that met it. "Are you going to participate in the exhibit?"

"I don't have much choice," he said before swallowing back a sip of the wine. "Let me paint you."

"No thank you," Aemilia laughed. A hand lifted to cup the sharp jut of his jaw. Thumb streaked lightly over his dark skin as her head turned. "I couldn't stand to sit still."

"That's right. Busy, busy Aemilia Prior. How long did it take me to convince you to stop working and go out with me?" His head ticked to the side in a teasing motion and he tapped at his chin. Free hand cut off the gas and blue flames died from beneath the pot that sauce bubbled inside.

"Six months," she mumbled.

"Six very long months," he agreed with a nod. "And let's not even get into how long it took me to convince you to spend the night. Now look at you -- Here on your own volition. I think you could sit still enough for me to paint you if you wanted to."

"Maybe I don't want to then." She shrugged and stepped away from him. Aemilia slouched against the doorframe and let her head loll. Eyes stared out over his gritty landscapes. He was obsessed with texture. All his paintings rolled up from the canvas in thick, messy ridges of acrylic and paper layers beneath. His hands folded over her hips and tugged lightly at the hem of her t-shirt. There was still flour in her hair and she smelled like vanilla and butter. A baker's smell. He buried his nose in her hair.

"Don't be mean," he said. A hand slipped beneath her shirt and sprawled over her belly. His palm was as warm as her stomach and comforting in its sprawl as fingers spread apart. "I won't make you sit for me, but I have one more request..."

She took a sip of her wine and head tipped up to stare at him.

"Move in with me." He kissed her temple, her ear. "If you hate this flat, I'll find another. Move in with me though. You have half your stuff here anyway. It's time."

"It's time?"

Adam nodded and his hands wandered higher. It was time for him. They had been dating over a year. She crashed out on his couch or bed more afternoons than not. The tops of ledges and counters were littered with her hair elastics and stubs from purchases made. She deflected in what he could have considered an answer as she slipped from him and pulled t-shirt from her skin. The material was cast aside as fingers curled into her palm. Dinner was forgotten for a fuck that occurred halfway between the kitchen and the bedroom. As her spine hit the plaster in a repetitive thudding, she tightened her legs around his hips and buried her face into his neck. Aemilia wandered -- a million miles away, across sea and the impermanent dots of islands between. New York City in her ears, summertime humidity on her skin.

Being there

I’m having trouble dipping into the creative center of my brain. By now, I’m pressed against the deadline that I’ve set for myself and I’m feeling that familiar pressure build. This is usually the place that I get the best and most of my writing done. Still, I falter. I can’t pick on an image that sticks. Instead, I get shreds of details and passing characters. Like this:

In 1959, Charlie Armstrong was discharged from the United States Army. On his way out, he made one last stop at the army post exchange. There, with the contents of his back account, he bought twelve pairs of pants and four dozen pairs of socks. The clothes were sturdy cotton and though simple in cut, well made. He didn’t look back.

In his brief stint, he had seen enough. It wasn’t the close calls of warfare and all its horrors that had left an impression on him. He was never deployed. Still, it was the men around him that seemed to leave a mark on him.

And that’s it. Who is Charlie Armstrong? I know where he came from, but the story still remains.

I get asked, “How’s it coming?” from the next room and feel a sense of expectation to produce this great new, finished piece. Eventually, I will. The thoughts in my head will be cannibalized and stitched into different pieces. Charlie Armstrong is up for alteration. He could turn up five years from now as a little girl orphan in an army surplus jacket. That’s how writing is for me. There is no formula, no magic moment to set me off. Instead, I wait until I can write, then I write.

I’m going to use the example of Charlie Armstrong to illustrate how I write five hundred word stories. The first step is to get an idea that is complete and not too sprawling. Generally character portraits or vignettes about daily life work best. Anything spanning time and place gets complicated. Still, it can be done. You think of your story and then write it completely out from start to finish.

In 1959, Charlie Armstrong was discharged from the United States Army. On his way out, he made one last stop at the army post exchange. There, with the contents of his back account, he bought twelve pairs of pants and four dozen pairs of socks. The clothes were sturdy cotton and though simple in cut, well made. He didn’t look back.

In his brief stint, he had seen enough. It wasn’t the close calls of warfare and all its horrors that had left an impression on him. He was never deployed. Still, it was the men around him that seemed to leave a mark on him.

This is 109 words. For this example, the story should be fifty words. The next process is editing. I’ll cut out and reorder things so that I’m left with the intact, albeit (sometimes) different, image. The first things to cut out are generally adverbs, needless adjectives, and any transitional words. It’s up to the writer to decide what is important.

Charlie Armstrong was discharged from the army. On his way out, he made one last stop at the surplus. He bought pants and socks. The clothes were sturdy, simple, and well made.

He had seen enough. Not the close calls of war, but the men around him. He didn’t look back.

Fifty-one words. Generally, stories end up being a word more or less. Rather than try to find an article to erase out, I leave it. It’s close enough to count as fifty. What’s left behind tends to be more succinct and direct. Gone are phrases like “seemed to be” or “looked like.” Everything is forced to be.