Listen. Don’t expect Shakespeare here. Chad is an idiot and it’s very difficult to write chapters for someone who doesn’t have more than ten thoughts a day. And this ain’t getting wrapped up in three days, unfortunately, because I opened up about forty-five cans of worms and haven’t addressed half of them.
Chad followed the weird chick out of the elevator which opened into a corridor lined with medical equipment parked outside the rooms. He glanced and never looked again at her nonexistent ass as she tiptoed in confusion down in the hall mumbling the room numbers to herself until she located Vanessa’s room. She peeked around the corner while he stood with his arms crossed, looking up and down the corridor. Tiffany and Brad were not in the room, and there was no point in checking anywhere in the ER. Maybe they got lost somewhere else?
The girl whispered, “Why don’t you go in first? She’s your girlfriend—she never even liked me—”
He took one long look down the corridor. “It’s, uh, too painful to see her suffering like that. I can’t handle it.” He uncrossed his arms. “I guess I’m just gonna leave.” He returned to the elevator and left the girl to handle it.
When the door opened, the creepy Mikhail was pacing around at a little distance away. When Mikhail saw him, he stopped moving and stared at Chad.
Chad ran his hand over his hair and frowned. He hurried through the automatic doors, looking over his shoulder one last time to make sure Mikhail wasn’t following him. Once at the curb, he stepped into the crosswalk and was almost mowed down by a red convertible before he jumped backwards onto the sidewalk.
“What the hell? Tiffany?” He ran to the passenger side. “Where’s Brad?”
She raised one eyebrow. “Brad? Which one is he again? The creepy one or the hot one?”
“The hot one—I mean—the not creepy one. The other guy.” He straightened the collar of his shirt.
“Ah, I see,” Tiffany said and scratched the corner of her open mouth with her pinky nail.
“Wait a second—the guard told me you took off with him—”
“I think we went out the door together. He ran off the other way around the building.” She lowered her sunglasses from the top of her head. “Aren’t you going to kiss me hello?”
“It’s one o’clock at night—why are you wearing sunglasses?” And why did she need to be so weird all the time? For once he was glad he wasn’t playing football right now. Who would want this showing up to their games and being in pictures?
“Migraines, dear.” She tapped her forehead with one finger. “Have you seen my poor sister?”
“No—uh, I was trying to go in and that weird girl who kept following me pushed me out of the way and the nurse wouldn’t let me go in.”
“Oh, well, that’s very strange. Say, why don’t you accompany me to her room and then I can drive all of you home? Since your other friends are here, too.”
“They’re not my friends!” he said in a huff, and then continued in a mumble, “maybe I should go back in case Brad shows up at the building.” He suddenly had an urge for a long, hot shower.
Tiffany slid her hand across the steering wheel. “Oh, I wouldn’t worry too much about that. He probably went home to sleep once he lost track of us.”
“Yeah…”
“Here, why don’t you get in and come along with me? I’ve got to park this baby somewhere and the garage is a little dark and scary at this time of the night.”
He shrugged and got in. It was starting to get old being driven around by her.
They had to circle up several levels in the parking garage. Finally she found an available visitor’s spot big enough for the vehicle.
“Look.” She pointed to the corner of the garage. “There’re some stairs in the corner. It’ll be quicker than finding the elevator. Of course,” a sob choked her breath, “stairs are very traumatic for me now.” She dabbed under her eyes. “I’m so happy I have a big strong boyfriend like you.”
Chad scratched his head. Why did her hair have to look like that?
Who the Hell Knows? 
My cousin studied Shakespeare last year in the school. Needless to say, every horror story I have heard turned out to be true.
Or maybe, both of us are just not the fan of medieval European writing.
Yes, yes, you can argue it is not exactly medieval, but I’m not here to argue semantics here.
Also, I was expecting Chad to get murdered in this chapter, but that didn’t happen for some strange reason.
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There you go, making my head hurt again… literary timelines exist in abundance and would expel the need for argument and the school of redundancy school semantics issues😉 Chad ain’t worth killing. My .02.
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Aw, I think people approach things with unnecessary fear, expecting the worst, and then expectations get confirmed. If it’s a second or third language though I could see how it’d be pretty darn scary.
And I agree with Phil, Chad is not worth killing.
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This entire case is from India. Remember, none of us speak English natively, nor do we enjoy European or British literature shoved down our throats forcefully. Case and point, during my secondary high school, I was forced to study the poem of W.B. Yeats, who was sad that things were changing, and people were losing their “values”.
During that entire experience, I often thought to myself, why should I give a damn about some poet about a hundred years ago, who can’t cope with the changes?
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I think when we are younger it seems that these ideas are out of date and aren’t relevant anymore, but the longer you go in life, the more you realize there is nothing new whatsoever under the sun. We can ask ourselves, what was happening when they wrote these things, what were they afraid of, and what ended up happening? In this way we find patterns or analogies to our own lives and through that understanding, we gain insight. It’s actually pretty exciting in a certain way when you realize you’re connecting with someone who may have lived one or two thousand years ago. Think of the long history of your own country!
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Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy reading history. But when you make me force to study it, then I’ll resent it, no matter how good the things may be.
Case in point, I have interest in combat sports, so I enjoy reading about the fighters from 19th century, or even the old Greek Olympics era. But poetry is something which I have never liked, therefore I have no interest in connecting with a poet.
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That’s called SCHOOL darling!
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And I’m glad that I passed it. Hated it from the beginning anyway.
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How?????
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The hard way. Go and sit through soul-crushing exams, and when you’re past that, go through even more pointless college. Doing college in India is pointless.
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Hey Hetty, you’re doing a great job with Chad, writing stupid is really difficult and I am really excited that this isn’t going to finish at the end of the month. I’m hanging out for Mr Squeaks to save the day 😊
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Thanks, Deb. Wow–I didn’t even realize it’s the 29th already! This month flew by… What a lazy bum I am! I know better than to let life get in the way because laziness inevitably picks up where it left off. Oh well!
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It’s coming along well Hetty, I don’t think an end date is set in stone, just a bit more each day. I’m loving it 😊
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This would probably be much improved if you re-wrote it in iambic pentameter.
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I’d have to remember what that is first. Poetry was never my strong suit.
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Just kidding anyway. It was the Shakespeare reference . . .
I can read poetry (without being sure I understand it) but I sure can’t write it.
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Ruh-rooooh! Chad is up next. Tiffany makes a great Cruella DeVille to the rest of the gang. I just realized, we don’t know what Mr Squeaks is up to. He was left alone in the apartment so anything could happen with a Tiffany on the loose. After the Boom we are back in double suspense. Love it!
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I wish I loved it! I lose the plot not because of writer’s block but because I completely forget what I’ve already written.
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I do the same thing- all the time. I have to go back and read the last two chapters just to figure out where I was headed and where I had already gone. The struggle is real.
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Yeah, but I’m in a real bind because I never read what I write once I’ve published it because I can’t handle the massive influx of cringe.
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I get you. I usually have writer’s remorse. I’ve read that is not so unusual with writers that haven’t taken the plunge into becoming a corporation that publishes the same story repeatedly only changing the characters names. On my side of your writing, I think you are supremely gifted, but I also live the horror of asking myself, what the hell did I just do? I think that’s why it takes so long between chapters. I have to overcome the trauma of the last chapter to write another one. It’s just part of the deal, I guess.
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I forget everything but the trauma!
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Let that trauma inform your writing. All of the greatest literature written in the world is based on the journey through the mindscape of
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Whoops. …Mindscape of trauma and it’s infinite causes. The hero’s journey has been the fallback plan since Homer wrote the Odyssey. And here is where the magic happens. The story is in the heroic struggle, not the happy ending. Of course, I’m a novice, so my failure to produce anything but stillborn pages is not a good example. I have fun trying tho.
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Lord knows I love the struggle, but thanks to being sheltered, I don’t know great trauma. I am pretty lucky, all things told. But every life is its own worthwhile journey should we accept it.
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I agree. I’ve found many people have a fascinating tale about their life. One never knows when an epic just passed them by unless we happen to be at the right moment to hear it.
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A lot of people get into the trauma version of a peepee-measuring contest and to me that’s just missing the point. I see it this way–in one sense, pain is relative, and in the other, it’s important to have perspective on things.
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This is genuinely a wise view of things. I always sense the witty genius behind the curtain in your writing and comments. I respect and enjoy your grasp of things. Plus, I snort laughed and leaked a little coffee on my iPad when I read the pee-pee measuring contest. So true. Never mind that biologists are sounding the alarm that the male member is shrinking at an alarming rate and male performance metrics are plummeting. Soon, our measuring days will be over unless we adopt the use of millimeters. Then what will we do to establish the Alpha in the group? We need a new standard. Hmmmm. I’m stumped. Any ideas?
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No no, let me tell you what it all means and how to write it😳 don’t kill yourself, it’ll get where it needs to go. Bear down on the meat and ease up on the potato salad till the air clears. We can’t narrate everything that’s awkward.
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I like to write myself a little permission slip and then it doesn’t matter if I write crap. It’s better than deleting everyone who follows me and then going MIA.
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I have a post about that coming… And we all need a pad of those permission slips. You aren’t writing crap, I was poking at your comments. If I had to write Chad there’d be a lot of head and crotch scratching and saying things like “It’s gotta get better, man” and “Uhh…fuckin A dunno” or “What’s with your hair?” because those dudes have no interpersonal filters.
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“crap” is my catchall word because I have a poor vocabulary. At least it’s better than in the urban high school where my fiance works. There he hears conversations like “I put my shit in her shit.” And yes you certainly know how to write dumbasses very well.
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Oh Jesus. The sounds like the crap you hear on one end of a phone call. An then I tole her, you know, whatever, and she says, you know, whatever, an I say, you know, whatever… WTF?
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Not quite. The word most often used isn’t “whatever ” but another word ending in “r” I can’t say.
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