Throwing Their Weight Around

I was a fat kid. I was a fat teenager. And I was a fat college freshmen. My first summer in college, I lost a tone of weight and went from being a size 40 waist to a slim 32. Jesus, was I happy. Some folks even said I looked anorexic. I realize the inherent danger and concern in such a statement, but to a life-long fat kid, the phrase was dangerously beautiful and empowering.

I have re-gained some weight and now teeter back at 36-38 waist. I realize that I am gaining back those pounds I lost, but I can still feel my hip bones, and to me that is wonderful. Hopefully, I can stay at my current weight and maybe lose a few. We shall see, but losing all that weight was wonderful.

Anyway, here are some musings. These are inherently auto-biographical and the kind of creative non-fiction that I hope to develop in the future. I adore creative writing and would give pretty much almost anything to be a Palahniuk, O'Brien, or, hell, even a Danielle Steel! However, I realize that I am not very good at creative writing. I will never ever quit it, but accept that I would be happy if it all just remained a dream. However, maybe I have a shot at this whole creative non-fiction thing. Let us try.

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Big Fat Kid runs to the bathroom after snack time and scans the row of stalls and sinks.
All clear.
He produces a clear, plastic case with a travel toothbrush the size of an car key. From his other pocket he will slip out a roll of toothpaste and then squeeze a liberal amount onto the frayed brush head. After wetting it with a quick spray of water from the faucet he will duck into the farthest stall, the one under the ventilator, and brush. Brush and brush and brush. He once cut into his gums and spat out a foamy mix the color of new bricks. He never dared to brush out by the sinks where someone could see him. Being fat was enough for the playground.
He swirls the brush head over the crowns of his molars, just as the dentist told him. He presses the brush head down so that the very tips of his teeth feel the plastic of the actual handle.
Once done, he wipes up the foam from the corner's of his mouth with a bit of toilet paper. Big Fat Kid then checks again for the bathroom to be clear.
He is safe, again.
He spits into the sinks and rinses out the rest of the foam from his mouth. He hears footsteps down the hall, but has already sheathed the brush back into its case and the paste back into his pocket.

He does the same after lunch and ever meal at home. His mother worries about the constant trips to the bathroom.
"What if he has to pee a lot?" She asks Father. "Isn't that a sign of diabetes?"
Father does not know, but looks at his son through the corners of his eyes, realizing his wife's concern. He imagines a doctor responding to his wife's question. "Well, we'll need some tests, but considering your son, I would not be surprised."
Father returns to his own work and so does mother, which includes scheduling the appoint to the dentist.

Big Fat Kid likes the dentist's office. There are no scales and the secretary always seems so warm and kind. Of course, her smile is perfect too. Big Fat Kid's has always been perfect. Never a cavity in his life. Up on the dentist's chair, Big Fat Kid opens wide and his cheeks just barely flub up over the bottom of his eyes. The dentist reaches in and she too has a perfect smile.
"You're teeth are in perfect condition young man. I have never heard of a ten-year old boy with teeth like yours." Big Fat Kid looks up, but only sees the powder blue outline of her smock surrounding the headlamp she wears over blond, curly locks. "Perfect," she says again with just some tiny motions in his mouth.
Big Fat Kids looks back up at the light, not trying to close his eyes, and enjoys the word "Perfect." He always likes the dentist. He always insists coming the two times a year recommended by the ADA. He likes his teeth, because he knows they are beautiful.

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After typing this, I realized it became a creative piece. Do'h...err...I mean, good?

When I was fat I hated how I was always off the charts at the pediatrician's office. There weren't spaces on the little graphs he used to tally my heart and weight in my file. While my mom I should be proud that I had to buy pants in the men's section at nine, you could hardly feel proud that you are fat. I understand the inherent ability of appreciating one's self and fucking all that negative body image crap. Skinny people can be, and are, just as un-happy as everybody else. However, unless you yourself have felt it, then you can't begin to appreciate the sheer mind fuck that is losing a ton of weight. I lost it all accidentally too, which I believe heightens the sense of wonder I have for the experience. In May I was fat and in August I was emaciated. Thanks, South Hill!

Just looks

In my previous post I mentioned how to 1) Keep activity on this blog going and 2)not become one of those bloggers with umpteen blogs with only one they actually update, I am turning part of the FOP into a book blog. So, I read something, and then snark about it. I mean if I am never going to actually get a book published then I should do the next best thing and critique other ones! Just like a real reviewer.

This post, however, is about book covers. While we know not to judge a book by its cover, it still needs to be eyecatching. Books are only cool when bound in leather AFTER they have become big. If I ever become a successful published author with multiple works then I would like for them to have similar appearances. Hence, each of my works would have some cover continuity.

Here is an example by a recently discovered and newly favorite author of mine, John Krakauer.




I appreciate the strak dualities in these covers. Krakauer always writes about people living on the edge. By edge, I don't mean gnarly extreme sports, but a man abandoning everything to live in the Alaskan wilderness, religious fanatics murdering in the desert, or people trying to touch the sky on Everest. I think his covers help reinforce the ides in his book. The cover picture is the place where it happened and the white is everywhere else, the safe society. The white space is boring and familiar. This offers some safety from the excitement and danger of the pictured location. The duality reinforces the haunting situations he describes. Into the Wild will become a movie in 2007 so those of you who don't want to read it can wait till then to see what I am talking about.

I also have soft spot for covers of the Vintage Contemporaries trade paperbacks of certain select contemporary articles. This publishing run took place mostly during the late 80's and early 90's and the covers show it. Just look at them.

The sheer clean-cut geometry of it and stark contrasts remind me a lot of those old Sega Master game covers. I think it might have been a reaction to the sheer garishness of the neon splatter most people think about when they hear "80's." But I am no art historian. They just remind me of the time.

VC keeps publishing books and their coves are always nice. Sometimes when I am in a book store and have some money to burn (not very often) I often just scan for interesting covers. Give it a try! Peace!

Beta Test

I had an interesting idea one day and actually produdced about a half-dozen drafts for the upcoming blurb you will read. Each one is different and I never got to the end in them. However, here goes a try, with an actual end. GO!

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Betta Test

The pinstripes on Joe's shirt scatter through the tank's glass. He is at the other end of the 60-gallon giant trying to straighten one of the tank's stands legs with his foot. He strains under the weighted fragility of the glass and pokes his tongue out from between his lips.
"Almost there," and his foot just nuzzles a doubled-up folded piece of cardboard on the floor. "Just need this for now." He looks at me. "You OK?"
My own lips taste a tiny bead of sweat that formed right above my lip. "Yeah, just hurry up."
Joe slaps his foot on top of the cardboard and pulls the piece next to the stand. With his knee he lifts the aquarium stand just a half-inch above the ground so that it falls neatly on the cardboard.
"OK, we can drop the tank now."
The stands rocks a little to the right, but Joe promises a permanent solution before completion.
Joe shoos me away and then slides the entire tank towards the back of the living room. The pine floors squeak as the metal footers dig into the veneer.
The noise brings our daughter Dana in from the kitchen. She gleams at the giant fish tank and immediately runs up to it slapping her hands on the polished glass.
"Oh, wow! This can hold a bunch of fishes right daddy?" Dana hugs one of the corners and tries to match the reflections of her palms from each side. Joe puts his hand on her stomach and shuffles her towards my legs. "Yes, honey, it can hold a lot of them, but don't touch it until daddy is done with the set-up." Joe never looks up from the tank, his hand pulling back once he felt my body push against it. "Kaia, can you go get one of the sacks of gravel from the garage?"
"The one leftover from when we made Neptune's home!?" Dana's own jubilation cuts my answer and she begins to run to the garage. The swish of the screen door announces her arrival.
Joe manages to look away from the tank and grimaces. "I don't want her wrecking this. She can go play with her own fish until this is done."
I wonder what a twenty pound bag of aquarium gravel would do to a seven-year old's back or about the various tools littering that spot on the storage shelf. I still make a response, tired of being in the dark. "And when will it be done?"
Joe cocks a smile and the bristle of his mustache pull away enough so i see the ends of his lips. "Soon! I need to run to the pet store though before the game tonight."
A metal clang comes from the garage followed immediately by Dana's muffled "I'm OK!"
Joe starts to walk in the opposite direction towards the wooden pegs by the door where we keep the keys. "Game? Tonight?"
"Poker game. I invited some of the guys from the office." Joe snatches his car keys.
Another metal clang only this time louder and then followed by the whining start of a sob.
"Aren't you forgetting something?" I pivot on my legs and begin to turn towards the garage. Joe comes from behind me and says, "Of course" before grabbing my hips and pulling me towards him. His kiss is nothing out of the ordinary, but his free hand runs on the back of my right thigh and quickly cups my ass. Dana begins to wail and I don't know how to react. Joe winks at me before letting me go and bolting for the door. The door slams. Dana keeps crying. The back of my legs tingle from where Joe pressed the folds of my jeans into them.

Dana calms down after I take her upstairs and put her in front of her own tiny aquarium. There I tell her a story about Neptune the goldfish's former life in a pond with always flowering swamp lilies. I tell her to write me something about Neptune, to watch his movements carefully and then tell me about them. It works with the kids at the school to unwind them after recess.
Handing her a piece of pink stationery paper from her tiny play desk I say, "We'll frame it and then put it by Neptune's tank."
Dana's face is still a bit red, but she smiles and grabs a purple magic marker that on her dresser. She takes her time looping the letters together to make the brief sentences.
Back downstairs I see where she banged her head against some shelving and the gravel behind a dusty string of Christmas lights. I pour the bag into the tank, but the layer lies thin over the bottom. I consider calling Joe to remind him off the color so that everything matches in this purchase, but ultimately hang up the phone before grabbing my own car keys.

I bring Dana on my Saturday errands. She hums the jingle to an used-car dealership ad we heard pulling out of the driveway. I keep thinking about Joe. About the fish tank, the poker game, and the grope. Before leaving the old job he told me he wanted more fun in this new city. Maybe that was it or that he was just excited by the new tank. Growing up on a farm his parents never let him have a fish. "We already got plenty of pets," he told me they would reply to his cries about buying an emaciated goldfish from the pet store window in town. He got Dana Neptune as soon as she even mentioned the word fish.

Dana keeps humming the jingle and I am happy we are almost done. I swing by the school to pick up a set of assignments I left on my desk. The security guard does not recognize me and only opens the gate once I threaten to call Principal Danvers at her home. Dana waits in the car and in my classroom I notice how late it got on the apple-shaped clock above the door. 5:32pm.

Back in the car I rip open a box of cookies once Dana says she hungry. The strip mall by the school features a small pet store, Pet Jungle, and I decided to pull in blaming Joe's actions on just plain excitement.
"How about we get something for Daddy's new fish tank?"
Dana wipes her mouth and gives me the whiplash inducing nods I believe only kids can give. "And something for Neptune's too!"
I nod, pulling into a space right by the store front.

A man walks out of the store with two baggies of those sullen beta fish as we enter. Inside I keep Dana close to me and away from all the distractions. I really just thought about a plastic plant or something. Dana waves to a golden lop rabbit in a dispaly by the aquarium decorations before the sheer selection overwhelms her. I grab a three for one pack filled with short, little squat shrubs with needle leaves. "This will do for daddy's tank." I press the container to my chest. Dana grabs a ceramic mermaid the size of a baseball glove and says, "Neptune would love this!"
"She is beautiful, honey, but she is bigger than Neptune's tank. Why not just a plant? Too remind Neptune of his pond. Remember?"
Dana pouts so that her lips leave a tiny shadow against her chin. "Ok." She spends a minute scanning the fake plants before settling on a pink and purple wispy reed with spatula shaped leaves.
At the check out counter another man buys a pair of beta fish.
"For your kids?" I ask him while the cashier fumbles with his credit card.
"No," he snarls back and then decides to just slap some cash on the counter.

Back home there are five men, excluding Joe, in the living room. He introduces them as buddies from the office and they all seem nice. Joe tells me that someone, Al, is upstairs using the bathroom, but he will be down in a minute. A quartet of pizza boxes lies on some newspaper on the couch. Some beer cans rest on the fold-out table. I hear footfalls on the stairs and turn to meet the man I can only imagine is Al.

It is the same man from the pet store. The man with the beta fish. He doesn't remember me and this time he comes off cordial. At the store i did not notice his height, but when i peer over his shoulder I see commotion in the fish tank. A glimmer of light and a brief splash. Squeezing though the boys to see the tank as a whole I see how Joe finished it while I was gone. A thicker layer of gravel, albeit a darker brown than the on I poured, rests on the bottom. Dozens of plants dot the gravel and sway with the currents kicked up by the fish. Rock piles dot barren areas of gravel without plants. Another brief glimpse of color comes at the corner of my eye. I turn to it and see a gossamer strand of bruised blue. A red and yellow beta fish darts past my eye sight followed by another one where the combination of red and yellow blends better into an orange sunset. All the fish are betas. A navy colored fish rams a purple one into a corner and keeps headbutting the other. The purple beta's gills flare open and close as it was gasping for real air. One of the boys squats next to me and looks up at Joe. "Looks like the purple one is going to get it."
I turn to Joe, but he doesn't see me. He carries a green skimmer net and one of the cue-ball sized bowls the betas come in. On the coffee stand I see two of those bowls each with a neat beta corpse lying in the moisture it carried away from the tank. I return to the tank and notice that it seems to shimmer from end to end. I press my own fingers to the tank and trace the brief starlight in the water before an umbre beta slams into the glass. Shrieking I lose my footing and fall back onto the floor.
It is one of Joe's friends that helps me up. "Don't worry about that. They sometimes even fight their own reflection." Joe has scooped the purple beta out of the tank and it completes it death throes in the smaller bowls. The friend notices the shock on my face. "Pretty sick, eh? It was your husband's idea. To give those beta a chance to do what they do. Told us he always really wanted a fish."
Joe never looks at me while his friend lifts me off the ground. I hear more footfalls from the stairs and see the laced hem of Dana's pajamas. I told her to change for bed before meeting her dad's friends. Joe's friend asks me something, maybe if I am OK, but I am already at the foot of the stairs and scooping Dana up into my arms. Running up the stairs she protests and the boys below holler at the battle royal.

In her room I lie to Dana and invoke the catch-all of "adult time" when she asks why she can't b downstairs.
"We'll have fun up here," and I pull the plants out of the pet store bag, which was looped around my wrist. She drops her selection in first and sits back to take the new tankscape in. Neptune comes from one of the corners of his five gallon home and circles the incomprehensibly colored plant. Dana smiles and then I had her the three plants I bought for Joe's tank.
"Aren't these for daddy's fish?"
I grab her wrist and together bring the fake shrubbery to the skin of the water. "He won't mind." We drop the plant in and sink it towards the gravel.
After installing the plants I ask Dana to read me the story she wrote about Neptune. It is three sentences long, but she insists on making a sudden addendum to account for Neptune's new forest. I don't notice when she falls asleep, but I also fall asleep in her room after watching Neptune duck in and out of his plants. The starlight in his tank is concentrated, more like a comet than a shower.
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Ok, well the idea was the betta battle royal and I am happy I finally got to it with this draft. Of course this is a hurried first draft, but I have my skeleton there. Being of the Palahniuk influence I identify with the absent father and the omnipresent mother. I want any draft of this final story to deal with masculinity, something I often write about, probably because of my lack of its traditional form. Peace!

Almost complete

Since I am really bad at this whole "inspiration" thing I have resorted to mining the Internet for those little writing exercises you encounter in pretty much every writing class out there. You know what I am talking about, right? Exercises like..."Your character has just met the devil. Write" (A Rishel one) or "Write about flying a kite" (An Ockert one). So here is one courtesy of Writers Block Solution: "Taking the Bus 1"

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Heat Seeking

The space heater coughed up a set of screws in the middle of the night. I thought I heard a clatter at 2am, but dismissed it as a dream, nothing serious. However, in the morning my pet rabbit Arizona kicked around a set of screws with the tips of his floppy ears.
"Did you do this Arizona?" I asked while aiming a tiny flashlight under the chocolate brown unit in the corner of my living room.
Arizona twitched his nose and pulled one of his ears to his mouth. He began to lick himself clean.
Last week the fridge had developed a frequent rattling that sounded like the clicking language of a bushman. And one of the stove burners always smoked no matter how hard I scrubbed the thing. The heater literally crapping out some of its vital innards should not have surprised me. I called Mr. Podos and left a message on his machine. Outside a stiff wind kicked up a miniature whirlwind of leaves and then I felt cold. Arizona stomped his back feet, cocking a leg just a centimeter off the ground before slamming it into the floorboards in protest. It was a Sunday.

I emptied out my hamper and spent thirty minutes trying to persuade Arizona into lying there. I hollowed out a little alcove in the socks saying, "C'mon you dumb bunny! You'll freeze!" I got down on the floor and motioned with my head, trying my best to be rabbit-like, but Arizona ran back to the kitchen a slumped on the cold linoleum. I noticed the sweat forming under my parka and considered staying in with some tea to keep me warm. However, I imagined Arizona would be fine.

Outside, I just caught the bus as it pulled up to the stop by the library. Bus E-7 ran across the county, a forty minute drive even without stops. Forty minutes of warmth under one of the fans right in the middle of the bus. I did this in the summer too, to keep cool under the air conditioner the bag ladies who always rode up front complained was too strong. I usually brought a book with me, but never got past the few pages. The bus always had a numbing effect on me so that I dropped in and out of sleep for the entire ride. It would be warm.

After ten minutes I noticed that I had no idea who was the driver. With Cliff or Amy they usually let me run around the full county loop if I dropped an extra dollar or two into the cash tray. I did this time, but the extra fare was all in dimes, hence not easily spotted. The driver had the tan colored polo of a trainee, instead of the navy blue of a veteran driver. I hoped he wouldn't turn out a hardass. He focused on the road, while I scrunched further down into my seat. I slept for another five minutes.

Katie got on the bus as it entered the city limits. She wore an powder blue sweater over a ruffled print skirt she threw over a pair of black leggings. At work she always seemed to combine two seasons like that into her clothes. The supervisor once called her odd, and I had wanted to say something, but the bus was just pulling up the curb that time too.

Katie cocked a smile at me and waved a glove hand. She shuffled over to my seat and swung around the pole to sit next to me. "Morning Jonathan."
"Hey, Katie." I straightened out and leaned my head against the window.
I hadn't noticed her backpack when she walked onto the bus. She dropped it. "What are you doing on the bus?"
Not having anything on me and it being a blustery Sunday I told her the truth. I told her about the heater and how I would freeze if not for the warmth of a nice bus ride.

[Bah! I am not even going to try and save that. I don't know why I introduced the feminine foil just for the hell of it. Bah! But I have an ending! Let us say our narrator, Jonathan, feels dejected after the bus ride.]

If the stairs to my apartment did not creek then I believed I would have heard the angry thumping from above. I opened the door and Arizona bolted out of the apartment, running to the stairs where he remained utterly confused at this difference in geography. Inside the apartment it was still cold and the pile of clothes remained untouched. Arizona stayed at the stairs twitching his nose and wiggling his whiskers until his tiny front paws curled over the precipice of a stair step and pulled forward. He was almost out.

Feminine Side

Any returning readers to my blogs should be familiar with the full story below. It was the first creative piece on the original blog of plenty and quite the departure from what I usually write about. Not that I have the talent/continuity needed to fit into a genre, but, instead, I just know I usually don't write about body issues. I have no idea why I wrote this story or why I even chose to present it to a class. However, here it is. It lines up nicely with the last post about the little boy with asthma. Maybe I can sell this thing to Seventeen or Cosmo Girl?

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Breathe With Me

By Garik Charneco

Jess wondered how weird it must be on the campus at seven a.m. on a Saturday as she laced up her left sneaker. Except for a few unlucky kids slicing bags of powdered eggs open at the cafeteria and the hooded employees at the gym flipping on light switches she must have been the only one up. She could have always slept a bit longer. But when she lied on the grainy sheets for too long she thought about what the crew guys in her 8am class were used to. Crew girls were so thin and not just that but also toned. That was powerful enough that Jess didn’t need an alarm clock anymore.

Jess laced up the other sneaker, grabbed the door knob and peeked out into the hallway. Some greasy pizza boxes, left over from last night’s floor meeting, peppered the hallway. Jess hadn’t had any of the pizza and made up the excuse that she was vegan. The RA’s believed it and left her alone for the rest of the program.

With the hall empty and sensing the opportunity for an unnoticed getaway, Jess grabbed her keys and student ID from the dresser. When her fingers curled around the doorknob the phone rang. Jess put down her things and plucked the receiver off the hook.

Jess’s parents still had trouble calculating west coast time. Her mother spoke in a chipper nasally tone. After the usual niceties the time finally hit mom.

“Oh my gosh! Honey, it must be 7am over there,” she said over the sound of ruffling newspaper pages.

Jess figured that she must have seen the time zones on the weather page. “It is ok.”

“I hope I didn’t wake you.”

Cradling the phone between her shoulder and ear Jess tried to shoo her mother away. “Really mom, it is ok. I was up already.”

“What are you doing up so early on a Saturday? It is still Saturday over there?” She giggled gingerly, amused at herself. “I am just so used to your brothers staying so close to home for school. You know at GMU and all.”

Jess rolled her eyes. “Yeah. It is Saturday and I was going to go to the gym.”

“The gym? I have heard of the freshmen 15 but Jessie aren’t you about a size five? Remember what Doctor Sorka said about body image.” The line went silent for a moment and then a quick gasp, like someone had just been choked. Then the clatter of porcelain as her mother got enough courage to speak and ask the big question. “Jessie this isn’t something serious? You are eating, right?”

It was about 7:15 then and Jess started worrying about too many other people in the gym. “Yes mom. I am eating and don’t worry.” Jess stole a glance at a picture of her family on the desk. Maybe it was her mother’s sincere concern or just the picture which was of the whole family, smiling, on the National Mall but Jess felt comforted. Then her mother spoke again.

“Is this about boys, Jessie? Because you…” Jess sighed loudly and actually worried about hyperventilating because of all the air rushing out. Her mother had raised three kids and wasn’t dismayed by light whines. “Because you are beautiful as you are. Your father and I don’t call you our stars and sky for nothing!”

Jess hated that pet name. Her parents had it all wrong. She knew that they were full of it and the whole ‘stars and sky’ thing was probably ripped off from an old folk song. They were parents and Jess knew that somewhere, deep in some parental codebook, there was a rule that said you always had to lie to your kids about how they really looked. It was right underneath the stipulation that said that you could never just understand. “Thanks mom but…”

“But nothing! Where did you get this horrible, negative self-image? I want you to look in a mirror and tell me what you see.”

Jess wandered over to the mirror before she even realized it. Jess thought whether she was just humoring her mother or whether she really wanted to see. At the mirror Jess saw the same things she saw last night. The words plain and plump came to mind. Jess envisioned first losing a bit more weight before starting on anything toning. It was 7:20 already. “I see fat.” Jess tried to pinch off some pudge from her side, trying to prove it, but her fingers slipped against skin.

“Oh really? Well if I remember my daughter then I see chestnut hair, sea foam colored eyes, a great smile, and greater skin. Can you at least be happy that your brothers got all the acne in the family? I could go on you know but I think it would start sounding a bit creepy. You have looks and a personality that someone can and will love Jess.”

Maybe someone could but not Jess. Not right now and not with this. She smoothed out the wrinkle at the bottom of her white tank top and wished she could do the same to her stomach. “Thanks again mom, but I’m still going. I’m already up and it’s just a quick run. To stay active, you know?”

Her mother groaned. “Do you at least have your inhaler with you?”

* * *

Of course Jess had her inhaler. She never went anywhere without her Snorkel. That was a pet name, unique and beautiful unlike ‘stars and sky.’ Jess stuffed her inhaler into the back pocket of her shorts as soon as she was dressed. It lived in a cloth cage and went everywhere that Jess went. Actually, the last thing she wanted was to be without it. Whenever Jess felt the wrenching asphyxiation of an attack it became father, mother, friend, doctor, nurse, and guardian for the brief terrifying seconds of the event.

The specialist told her that the asthma would subside as she got older. If anything it got worse and Jess spent plenty of time in high school, sitting in the back of classrooms, gasping in and out trying to calm her treacherous bronchioles down. At those moments she wished she could have taken just one burst but she was in class and it was high school.

Jess wasn’t supposed to exert herself too much. Remembering her mother’s warning and all her years of asthmatic experience she pulled the inhaler out and thumbed the plastic shell. The tiny nooks on the inside of the orange mouthpiece cap were lined with fuzzy blue lint from a lifetime stuffed in pockets. The once neon yellow shaft had been buffed to a paler shade of saffron. The label on the party popper cylinder melted away at the edges, but what mattered was still good. Jess conjured up a word for her relationship with her Snorkel: extreme anthropomorphizing.

Saturday mornings the gym was only sparsely populated with overachieving athletes and insomniacs that needed some sort of a release before they could sleep. It always smelled of an antiseptic massage. Jess signed in at the front desk, her name being only the third of the day. She tried to keep the sound of the pen on the paper to a minimum, so she wouldn’t draw the attention of the lone employee who didn’t even bother checking ID’s this early. Jess tucked the pen back under the metal clip of the clipboard and tugged at the bottom of her tank. With her shirt slipping off her collarbones and over her stomach, Jess waddled past the front desk and onto the actual exercise floor.

Those two other people on the list must have been changing because Jess faced an empty floor, lined with still slick treadmills and free weights. She looked back at the front desk, wondering if the guy was in one of her classes, but he held his head down. Jess shuffled over to the farthest treadmill, one under a popping speaker that blurted out soft Muzak. Elevator music suited Jess.

She stretched her long legs and tried hard to not look like some crazed crane. Jess had always hated how awkwardly tall she was and her sandpiper legs were to blame for it. She tossed the keys, ID, and inhaler into the water bottle holder and throttled the speed to the highest it could go. Faster was always better.

After nine or so minutes she felt the first squeeze of her chest by some great invisible hand that possessed her body. She closed her eyes and tried to not think about the inhaler in front of her and the relief that it promised. Her mind clung to other things; class, homework, boys or anything else but that tiny oasis in front of her. It was a small neon siren that called her back to the life she was running from.

At the thirteen minute marker there was another chest ripping bolt that made her cough. The cough turned into a cackle and ricocheted around the gym’s high glass and steel walls. The clerk at the desk looked up from his computer screen and towards her. She stifled a dry wheeze and tried to look normal, but how normal can one look pounding away at a treadmill and pining for first hit of Proventil? She fingered the inhaler’s cap open like a champagne cork, holding it in between her thumb and hipbone. The attendant shrugged and turned back to his computer screen. Jess took the opportunity and pounded the stop button. The belt began to lose speed and she gobbled up gulps of mist in quick, machine gun fashion that assaulted her wincing lungs. The smell of the stuff was the closest thing to euphoria she had ever experienced. This was the feeling of being born and taking in your first huge gasps of air as your lungs, the last organ to develop, engorged in their new responsibility. On this high it was easy to get lost in the moment.

The belt lulled to a stop but the machine ejected Jess off it and into a set of free weights. The entire building rang up in a crescendo that brought the attention of everyone onto Jess. The single employee actually stood up at his desk and peered over the floor. Those two other patrons appeared and looked. She took three more gulps of the stuff and the inhaler was happy to give it up, like a greedy bartender giving a wino just one more drink. She thought she heard it say “Sure, Jess. Have another.” Jess pressed the clammy device to her heaving chest and brought her knees up around it. Jess tried to reassure herself. It didn’t say anything, she thought while someone asked, over the sound of footfalls, “Are you ok?” Jess took another hit from her inhaler, this time drawing the mist in slow and keeping her lips to the mouthpiece. She felt someone grip her shoulder, a large hand holding onto a shaft of bone. Above her was the lone employee, a boy, with brown eyes still groggy from the dawn and smooth taut skin. He was in one of her classes and Jess tried to compose herself, propping up against the treadmill. She put both her hands around her inhaler and pulled it away from her lips. A gossamer line of spit trailed from her lip to the edge of the mouthpiece.

The employee winced, his skin furrowing into kneaded hilltops. Running his hand along her shoulder his fingers wicked up sweat and radiant heat. Flicking his hand, droplets of liquid pouring off, the employee asked, “You ok? Did you fall or something?”

Jess swivels her head back, confirming he is her psychology class and then shooting her head away, so she faces the eggshell colored brick wall. She tried to calm herself, breather slow and smooth so her lungs stop asking for too much air. She tucked her inhaler under her knee where it was out of sight, but also where it jutted into soft flesh. Jess nodded and muttered, “Yeah, fine. Just slipped.”

The employee crouched down and looked her over. “You sure?”

Jess took a small breath, trying to wedge it down her throat, but her body, tired and broken, rebelled. She sputtered and felt the mouthpiece of her inhaler press against the back of her knee. It was right there, making its presence felt and Jess just wanted this guy to leave. Come back later, she thought, letting the inhaler push into her skin. “I am fine. Just fell.”

He came out of his crouch and the folds of his sweatshirt brushed Jess’s side. She caught a glimpse of the inlay on his name tag. It said Tyler and Jess struggled to get enough energy and breath to mention his name. “Take it easy.” Tyler extended his arm out, offering to help her up.

Jess lifted one arm but then caught her reflection in the band of his watch. On the silvery links she saw brown veins of hair matted onto her forehead between droplets of sweat. Her eyes were sunken into their sockets, receding like pools at low tide. Her entire body was red and Jess felt she could glow in the dark. She pulled back, saw the surprise in Tyler’s eyes and felt the inhaler under her knee poking, a tiny incubus offering pleasure with a grip and a squeeze. Jess glanced into her reflection and shook her head. Tyler pulled back his arm and stuffed it into the pocket of his jeans. He swiveled on the balls of his feet, his job done and offer rejected.

Jess watched him walk away and observed how the cuffed hem of his sweater undulated with each step. She extricated the inhaler from underneath her; saw the oblong groove it left and poured another burst of artificial air. Jess brought the inhaler back to her chest and then pressed her knees against her ribs. The inhaler, cradled by her and tethered to her, followed Jess’s heart in an ultimate infinity of up and down. Up and down. Up and down.

The trick is to keep breathing

Hey! Sorry for being away for so long! Remember that post I put up on October 19th 2006 and how I went on and on about how I had the entire story in my mind and all I had to do was put it into words? Remember? I was excited! Of course, I was so excited that I forgot what the hell I had in mind for it! DAMN IT! Oh well, it will always be here on FOP in case it hits me again.

Here is a tiny sketch about a topic that I have written about creatively in previous endeavors. I will post that story up some other time. I feel awkward about the aforementioned full story, but let us try this sketch first.

I know I stole that title line from somewhere, but can't put my finger on the exact source.

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Miranda ran back to the car to get the meds. The rest of the children fled the playground, but the bully remains. He wore a shirt with a cartoon dragon on it with a flaming lizard skull for a head. His fingers gripped a clod of dirt, but on the rim of my glasses I saw that his fingers were trembling and tiny flecks of dirt slipped from his fingers.
"Just one punch," he muttered. "Just one. Nothing big. A tap!" He ran towards me, the clod of dirt still in his hand.
"Go away!" My scream tickled the top of my throat. The resonance reminded me of my experiences on the playground screaming across the gully created by a commercial developer's bulldozers. We tried to see who could scream the loudest. I never won, but this scream stopped the bully. I brought Ellis closer to my chest and his head towards my heart. "Go away," I repeated. "Go away and we won't tell your parents. Just go away!"
The bully took a step back and did a double take between my eyes and Ellis', which were rolling back slightly into his head. The bully dropped the clod and ran towards the edge of the playground. I followed his retreat, also eyeing Miranda as she came back with the backpack.

I looked back at Ellis and slid my hand below his shirt. The bruise on his chest had already risen just a bit above the rest of his sink. I felt the whorls of broken blood inside the bruise and imagined the colors through my fingers. Mushy clods were lavender and turgid blobs were blue. Ellis was sweaty from the game and sliding my hand under his shirt so that is cradled his back, I thought him how to breathe.

Heavy panting became whispery wheezing and I held him closer so that my own breathing pushed my abdomen against his. The wheezes were short and metallic with a wet faint gurgle to them. His lungs could not decided whether to whine or scream towards asthmatic asphyxiation.
"Ellis. C'mon Ellis! You have to breath to your nose, like this." I cocked my head back and took a deep nasal breath as if trying to beat the dogs at the airport. In Ellis' own glasses I saw the way my nostrils flared and briefly trembled under the deep breath. I repeated the motion for Ellis who then began to cough. His coughs crackled agaisnt his throat the sides of his mouth before they shotgun out him. Miranda was close at that time, but she still seemed as if she had just gotten up from the picnic table and tapped my shoulder after seeing the bully deck Ellis in the chest.
"Nose, Ellis! Nose!" I sat him up, but still held him to me. He coughed into my shoulder and wound-up for a long wheeze when I screamed again. "Nose! Breathe through your nose!"
I brought my other hand up and pressed my palm to his mouth. Then his own nostrils flared. He inhaled and I pulled him away from me. He exhaled and then I pulled him closer. This other form of breathing also made him wheeze but this one had a hum to it instead of a slice. Miranda arrived with the inhaler and swatted away from hand from Ellis' mouth. She replaced it with the plastic tube. She pumped at the cylinder and blasted shot after shot of aerosol into him. He began to lie back and after Miranda popped the tub out of his mouth he kept breathing through his nose.