The exercise:
Write about: the perfect illusion.
So concludes a week of (almost entirely) Lady Gaga inspired prompts. Greg, I hope you enjoyed yourself with them, or that they at least served as a bit of a distraction while you're out there growing a new tooth.
3 comments:
I'm pretty sure it's sharks and their kin that grow new teeth all the time... and while that would certainly be useful, I'm not sure what to make of the suggestion that I'm a shark. I think I shall just smile at you, with row after row of beautifully sharp, new teeth on show :-p
Stitches from the extraction should come out on Thursday morning so there shall be an update then. And yes, I have enjoyed this week of prompts, for all that I don't think I would ever have expected them!
For today let's catch up with this guy.
The perfect illusion
I stopped at a gas station with a backdrop of blue-purple mountains to refill the tank. It was about an hour after dawn, I'd been driving for most of the night, and the air was fresh with just a gentle breeze tickling the back of my neck. The gasoline smell mixed in with something brighter and more floral, and either side of the station dirt tracks led back into fields. I checked the pumps, and sure enough there was diesel available too: the farmers must fill up here from time to time. I stretched, wondering how I could get so stiff from just sitting still and watching the road-markers go past, and checked James's wallet. My wallet. Which was sadly rather empty.
I strolled into the station and looked around: chocolate bars and bags of crisps at child-snatching height in front of the counter; cans of oil and brake-fluid on shelves to one side; a refrigerated cabinet with soft drinks, more chocolate bars, and some plastic wrapped sandwiches. Plexi-glass separating me from the other side of the counter, and the attendant was asleep back there, sat precariously on an office chair with their head lolled back, their mouth wide open, and snoring like a hibernating grizzly.
Back outside and round the back -- as I suspected the toilets were locked and I'd need to get the key from inside. From sleeping beauty, assuming I could wake them. I sighed and looked a little closer at the door, and then at the one next to it. Same make, same kind of lock. The kind I'd learned how to pick blindfold when I was... let's just say some time ago. I didn't even need to go back to the car for anything, opening it with the key would probably have taken more effort. Clearly there wasn't much crime around these parts. I looked around again and wondered if there was much of anything that wasn't agricultural. Then the door to the attendant's booth was open and the snoring was like a chainsaw left on idle.
There was a baseball bat, aluminium, propped under the counter, which told me how much trouble the attendant had on any given day. I picked it up and brought it down hard enough on his throat to bend it which converted the snoring into the bubbling splutter of trying to start the chainsaw when it's out of fuel, but that died away quickly. While it died I opened the till and refilled my wallet, and turned the pump I was at on.
The thing is, if you don't plan coincidences and random chances build up and eventually pull you down. So I folded the attendant up and pulled his pants down and turned him slightly away from the counter so to anyone coming in it looked like he was sucking himself off. I moved the toilet key to where you could grab it from the other side of the counter, and then went out to fill up the gas tank before the pump turned itself off automatically.
I did pop in for a couple of sandwiches -- only two days old -- before leaving and checked the scene. A perfect illusion -- no-one would be disturbing the guy unless they really, really needed the gas.
And then it was time to drive on.
Are you looking for me?
Don't bother
I'm right here
Hiding in plain sight.
Greg - well I'm sure sharks have many admirable qualities. Can't think of any off the top of my head, but I'm quite certain there are many of them...
There's such a calmness to everything this guy does, even the violence. You write him well and it's always a treat to read his story, for all it is also unsettling.
Morganna - I could use this sort of ability on a rather regular basis :)
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