Character was in the office when he got the call, in the middle of a generic conversation with Minor Character A about work-related things. "It's our mutual relation, his older sister told him, through sobs that choked the phone lines. One of his relatives had died. This sentence triggers a lame series of reminiscences which in turn reveal far too much in far too short a period of time about Character, but this is a fucking short story, and we have no time to waste.
So character was on his way to a funeral. Death is important because its sad, and this is a fucking short story, so we've gotta pack in as much important stuff as we can. Imagine three or four really flowery sentences describing the plane ride, with a few details about Character illustrating something characteristic of his character.
Then, usually, there's a sentence here like, "he couldn't remember the last time he'd been to a funeral,” which is a stupid sentiment to begin with, but whatever, he couldn't remember the last time he'd been, so he thought about death. One or two vague and pedestrian philosophical suggestions should be inserted here, to add more weight and gravity to the already boring train of things I've told you without showing you anything at all. Anyway, this is a short story, so I've gotta keep moving.
Character had a girlfriend. He did? Sweet. He thinks about her body, and of course, about sex. Maybe he remembers a smell or something-what is it with smell? Like you can describe smells without using other smells anyway. I don't think he really likes reminiscing but you have to do that in order to get all these back-story details out real quick. Then I have to jolt him back into the present with some sort of action so you don't lose interest. So he looks a stewardess up and down, without really meaning to, and she catches him. They both break eye contact, and for a minute, Character thinks he catches her looking back at him, and smirks, in the way that self-assured people do when they know they're right. But that makes him think of his recently passed on mutual relation, who was probably cool, but I can't really be too specific or else something bad would come out. That's the funny thing about most dead guys in shows and books- you usually only hear the good stuff. Anyway, now Character is sitting there, slowing turning over all these heavy thoughts about death and flighty erotic thoughts about the stewardess on his flight, when, expectedly, the plane lands, and Character gets off in…a city.
In this city, there's a ton of nouns, modified by adjectives, and Character notes many of them. He sees sights. Adverbially, he travels to the hotel. He deposits his luggage once he gets to his room, and stops, noticing the stale, septic air in the hotel room. It makes him sad, because this is a fucking short-story, and it's gotta be about "life" and "truth" and "real" things to be worthy of being "serious" instead of entertaining, so fuck it, he's depressed as shit. I mean, I don't know, what do you want him to do? Maybe he turns on the TV instead, or maybe he takes a crap. Normal people don't do that many drastically interesting things when they're sad (that's why they call it sad). So he runs the water and splashes it on his face and goes out to see the sights.
He sees the sights. They are fun and fill him with synonyms for "happiness." Then he winds up at a jazz bar, because it's quiet and he's the type of guy who doesn't like the strip-mall brand of chain-restaurant good-times. So he's got class, which is illegal to have if you're writing about John Everyman. But anyway, Character is feeling good, having a gin-and-tonic and he sees a girl. He could do any number of things here, but I'm really tired of this being a fucking short story, so he starts talking to her, screw all this description.
"Hey," he says, smiling.
"Hi." She looks at him blankly.
"Mind if I join you?"
"Sure." She finally smiles a little. She thinks, boy I'm glad he waited for a response before sitting. That's because, physically, she's been too cute to ever have been hot and therefore never learned to be a mean little bitch.
“These guys are really good.” Character eyes the band. "I can't believe they played so much Roland Kirk." Roland Kirk is cool because he's not super mainstream jazz. It also implies Character has seen enough jazz to know hardly anyone plays Roland Kirk anymore.
"Yeah. They tend to play some real fun stuff," she says back.
"I'm Character," he says, extending his hand.
"I'm Love Interest," she says back.
"Buy you a drink?" he asks.
"Sure."
Back at the hotel room, Character and Love Interest are chatting away, laughing, talking about funny stuff. Notice the tasteful transition to the bedroom without any cheesy pick-up lines or incredibly razor sharp movie dialogue that you see way too much of nowadays. Alright, back to it-they're laughing.
"I can't believe you stole a giant, stuffed grizzly bear," she tells him.
"Well, we needed a bear for the homecoming game, he says, laughing at he says it, remembering some high-school prank.
"Where'd you go to high school?” she asks. Then it comes out: he's in town for a funeral. Here I could totally reveal the girl to be a hooker, or have her leave, but I don't want to do that, so let's have fun instead. They have mind-blowing sex and really enjoy it. Like, a lot. They pump away like it's going out of style tomorrow.
So they're lying there afterwards, heaving with sighs.
"I always meet guys like this."
"What, after sleeping with them?" He smiles, and she does too.
"No, always temporary people. Going somewhere else, here for a year or two. Moving south or north or to different coastal cities." She looks at him without being overly sappy, because she's stable and has self-confidence, because obvious insecurities are really easy to write and make predictable people look for validation. Back into it for one last quick piece of dialogue for redemption:
"Maybe you should move." They smile at each other and the thought hangs there, the last thing said before they settle in for the night.
He leaves the next morning, and they exchange contact info. He goes off to this funeral, and she goes to do whatever she does. Character and Love Interest are seemingly now separated, never to come back. Obviously, this is a cheap ploy to lengthen an already too-long story because I am utterly unable to write plot, that's why I write about life and death and important, serious things. And she wouldn't be called Love Interest if she was a one-night stand, she'd be named "Shitty Plot Device to Illustrate Predictable Aspects of Character's Character." So the two ships sail off to separate shores, and lo and behold, they may never see each other again.
So normally there'd be a few pages here where Character finds, realizes, and changes what's wrong with him. But he's my character, so he's going to be a kick-ass dude who self-actualizes and gets all introspective. He already knows what's wrong. He's not bored, he likes his job, and he wants to have three sons and teach them all to fish and camp. So he gets rid of that girlfriend he thought about on the plane, cause she was a real bore, and one day, boom, Love Interest emails him!
See, now I'm in trouble. Two people are about to be happy. You can't write successful stories about "people" and "human relationships" unless they totally fuck their lives up and hate their existence, because John Updike wrote a bunch of books like that, and Arthur Miller did a few plays about it too. But it's too late, my two characters are in love and about to fuck their brains out in several graphic and florid passages. But I can still salvage this, just watch me. Now there's another funeral. Minor Character A dies. BOOM, circular plot, end where we begin, what an amazing craftsman I am! I must've READ A BOOK OR TWO in my life.
Minor Character A might've been introduced earlier, no one really cares, but you recognize him, and by killing him, I have again used another tasteless gimmick to disguise my inability to write compelling fiction. Also, by ending the story in a circular fashion, I can give a huge sense of completeness to what might otherwise be called a "complete piece of shit," as the critics call it. Unfortunately, we've got to be true to the form, and keep talking about death and life and relationships, man, so people will read it and say "how true" or something equally mundane.
Character left the funeral after the services and walked out of the church to his car. He gets outside to his car and watches the wind blow over the blades of grass on a long green field, and he smiles. Somewhere in the distance two squirrels chase each other around the trunk of a pine tree, and a plane passes by overhead, conveying hundreds of characters to other chapter endings. See? Isn't that a much nicer way to go than having me jerk off yet again with description and heavy thoughts? See, now for a minute I bet this seemed like a fucking short-story. I don't think I'm supposed to ask that though. Oh well.
By Michael J. Weingarth
