[stylist] Quick bit/Re: Changes writing prompt

Fri Jan 13 04:16:15 UTC 2012

You have such a wonderful way of writing that draws the reader into whatever 
you write.  That's a strange piece, but I like it.
Barbara

A man who wants to lead the orchestra must turn his back on the crowd. --  
Max Lucado
-----Original Message----- 
From: BradDunsé
Sent: Thursday, January 12, 2012 9:59 PM
To: Writer's Division Mailing List
Subject: [stylist] Quick bit/Re: Changes writing prompt

Very off cuff draft. Sort of "sentence to
sentence where do I go from this one" kind of thing. haha
. More of an idea flush than proper grammar and
etc. as there were some format/font issues I ran into.

Pete Wilkerson, a middle-aged, slightly graying,
business cut, Robin-egg blue collar worker, stood
at the early morning gas pump with stiffened arms
plunged into the pockets of his black Columbia
ski jacket zipped to the neck. The near zero
temperatures on this frigid January morning left
his freshly groomed mustache and beard fair game
for the tiny droplets of moisture bursting from
his mouth to attach themselves, adding a little
extra touch of salt to his peppered whiskers,
temporary as it might be. The frigid gas pump
churned out a labored noise sounding a bit like
negach … … Negach … Negach … Negach … Negach …
Negach …. He daydreamed how the pump almost
sounded like it was chanting to him in a frigid
rhythmic pain of complaint as it creaked gas from its belly into his truck.

Pete’s job for the last ten years was working as
an electrician at the local campus in Superior,
Wisconsin. Graduating as an Electrical Engineer
after attending night classes for the past
8-years at the local university, he finally felt
like he was coming into his own now working as a
part-timer at the local power plant. That’s why
he considered himself as Robin-egg blue collar. A
little bit engineer, a little bit electrician …
not quite white, not quite blue.

With shoulders hunched as much as he could to
cover the bare skin of his neck, blowing into his
cupped hands, giving a slight palm to
back-of-hand circular rub, like you do when
washing your hands, he began to bounce up and
down on his toes trying to work up just a little
heat while his thirsty super-cab Ford pick-up
drank in dual tanks of go-go juice and the pump
continued its complaint, Negach … Negach … Negach … Negach … Negach … 
Negach ….

Hanging up the nozzle, snatching his credit card
out of the pump, and pushing the receipt button
gave an Out of paper message. “Yeah right,” he
muttered under his breath, “like I believe you
guys actually put paper inn those things in this
weather. And the little extra crap people buy
once they get in your store looking for their
receipt doesn’t hurt either does it fellas?”

Flipping the tank-fill door shut on his truck he
headed for the store to get his receipt. Jumping
up onto the pump island on his way inside, he
stopped with a shiver, but not from the cold
weather this time.  He couldn’t help but feel
that same feeling he’s had on-and-off all week.
Almost like he was being watched. Taking a quick
look over his shoulders walking as he continued
hesitantly , and yet another quick  scan around
the parking lot as he  reached for the door,
proved nothing abnormal. Still, he couldn’t help but feel something was off.

Sometimes the feeling was quite strong, and other
times just an inkling of a feeling. Sort of like
when you’re camping out doors and you find a
spider on the sleeve of your sweat-shirt, you
flick it off in a reflex and shudder your
shoulders creepily, and a minute later you swore
you felt one under your shirt just a little
trickle down the skin of your shoulder blade, but
a shoulder wince and shirt adjustment, you
realize it’s just a wrinkle in your sweat-shirt.
That’s how it was with this feeling of being
watched, or whatever it was well, he wasn’t sure
exactly what it was he felt for sure.

Standing in line a few minutes, somewhat troubled
by this feeling, he suddenly chuckled to himself
as he stared at his hands. A king size Snicker
bar in one hand and a five-dollar bill in the
other. Smiling to himself he thought, “Ok boys, you got me … this time.”

Paying for his stick of chocolate bliss, he
refused the bag, dropped the bar in his chest
pocket, shoved two dollar bills, the gas receipt,
and some coin into his left Levi pocket, and headed for the truck.

Reaching for the handle of his pick-up door, he
stopped for a moment. Again, something seemed
off, He could hear one of the pumps on the island
with its Negach … Negach … Negach … Negach …
Negach … Negach …, but as he glanced over, he
realized there was no one at the pumps; he was
all alone at the island. Turning his broad
shoulders towards the rear of the truck with his
head slightly cocked forward to take a better
listen. He got half way to the tank fill of his
truck and the noise stopped with a clunk. He
stood there a moment listening but the pump held
its silence. Turning back for the driver’s door
he took a quick squint towards the station and
realized the attendant had been staring at him.
He stood there a second looking at the
20-something man, “boy really” he thought, “just
passed his last crop of zits,” and the man began
to smile. But not like an “Oh did you drop your
keys back there and you found them” kind of
smile, it was more like a, “you can’t see me but
I know something about you” smile. Still staring
at Pete with an odd grin, the attendant picked up
the phone next to him, never taking his eyes off
Pete, lifted the phone to his ear, and with a
trance-like beam into Pete’s eyes from 30-feet
away. started talking to the caller.

Pete smiled back as if a “hey, it’s all good
dude,” kind of smile and headed for his truck.
Now he really felt like he was being watched.
“Little creep,” he muttered as he hopped in his
truck. Turning the key, the trucks idiot lights
and radio came on; you know the multiple red
warning lights that come on when hitting the
ignition? But the truck didn’t turn over. Holding
the key all the way over for a full ten-seconds,
suddenly the truck gave a, buzz sound, a quick
little clunk, and then it fired over. “I know
Hun,” he said, “I hate this cold weather too”. He
dropped the shift into drive and headed towards
the street. In the frozen exhaust from Pete’s
truck, pump #2 began its Negach … Negach … Negach
… Negach … Negach … Negach … As he drove off.

After putting in a half day at campus and the
other half at the power plant office, Pete pulled
in the garage, hit the automatic door opener to
shut the overhead door, and walked into the house
where he was greeted with a gush of pleasant warm
air and the smell of fresh cheese-garlic bread in
the oven next to a pan of lasagna. His wife Trudy
was at the kitchen counter fixing smoothie
desserts as he leaned over and dove his cold face in the nape of her neck.

“Oh, you’re cold,” she whimpered  lifting her shoulders to lock him out.

Kissing her quick on the cheek and tossing his
keys on the counter top as he walked taking off
his jacket, he asked her “So, how was your day?”

  she began to tell him “Oh, Mackenzie was up to
her old tricks again, getting everyone  a good
bout of the grumps, but she’ll …” she stopped
when she realized he wasn’t even in the room now.

Realizing she stopped talking,  Pete yelled, Oh.
Sorry Hun, I’ll be right there.”

Pete hung up his jacket in his office closet.
Their kids Amber and Michael were out on their
own now and their bedrooms now became his and her
offices. Pete reached in his front left pocket of
his jeans, taking out the money to put in his
glass jar, his vacation stash he called it, and
stopped to remove a sheet metal screw he knew was
in with the coin. He began to get that damned
feeling again, like something was watching him or
well he just couldn’t say what the feeling was
like something was unsettled. As he fingered
through the coin for the sheet metal screw, he
noticed one of the quarters he’d gotten from the
gas station attendant that morning. Pete looked
at it with a peculiar interest. He flipped it
over and back again and all seemed right, but
then he noticed the date. Staring at it he wasn’t
sure what to think of it. The date on the coin
was 2014, but today was only January 13, Friday
actually, January 13, 2012. A whole two years
before any 2014 coin would be circulated and
6-months at least before they’d even start to bee
minted. But it was real, the markings, the
president, the tails and knurling on its edge
were all normal. He palmed that one in his right
hand and fingered the other coins. He stood open
mouthed. All the coin in his pocket were dated
2014. The two bills he’d gotten though, they were
dated 2001 and 2005. He wasn’t sure what that
meant so tossed them aside. He set the coin down
on the corner of his desk, grabbed the huge glass
jug that held an inch of various coin since just
before Christmas when he cashed in the previous
year’s loot. Pouring out a few coins he   nearly
dropped the jug. Every single coin he poured out
was dated 2014. But the dollars that were stuffed
in there, they were all various odd dates, all
past dates he noted. Only the coin was dated two years from this year.

He recalled the smug smirk on that pimply
attendant’s face this morning at the gas station
before he got in his truck. And that pump with
its Negach … Negach … Negach … Negach … Negach …
Negach …. When just before he saw the attendant
staring at him through the window. That pump,
with that almost chant. It sounded like it was
saying Negach …, he thought to himself. He heard
his wife call out that it was almost time to eat.

“I’ll be right there Hun!” he yelled from his office.

He stood there with a finger rubbing over the
coin, images of that attendant, and the pump with
its complaint of cold, Or was it a chant of cold?
He thought to himself, “Was it actually saying
Negach …? over and over and over? What is a
Negach … and what is up with these coins and their date. Why 2014?”

He set the coin down, pulled up his office chair,
sat down with a pen and paper and wrote out
phonetically what sound or word or chant he
thought the pump had sounded out. Negach …

Spelling It out he was perplexed, and yet
something seemed oddly familiar about it. Staring
at it he got an idea; he grabbed his pen and
began writing more. Stopping his pen, his cheeks
nearly to the corners of his mouth in disbelief,
he looked at his paper, looked over at the coin
lying on his desk, all dated 2014. His face turned fish-belly white.

Writers note: *I had to use that one Donna. big laugh*

He looked to the coin … and back to the paper,
then back to the coin, or more appropriately, the
change. That’s what we call loose coin isn’t it?
he asked himself.  He stared down at his paper that had the below words on 
it:

Negach

Enach

Angech

Chenga

Change

Is that what the pump at the gas station was
chanting? Change … change … change … change? And
all these coins, all this change dated 2014, what
does that mean? Is something going to happen to me in 2014?

Brad Dunsé

"The key to change is to let go of fear." --Roseanne Cash

http://www.braddunsemusic.com

http://www.facebook.com/braddunse

http://www.twitter.com/braddunse
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