I co-wrote these with BethanyM — or actually: I wrote them, and we edited/finalised them together. The booger spotting story was her idea, though.

Metallica separates people

Zwolle, Netherlands — Two days ago a curious bicycle accident took place in our fair town, involving two fans of the American metal band Metallica. 17-year-old Julie K. riding down the Luttekestraat, crashed headfirst into Lies F. (17), who was crossing the road, and sent her flying into a porch with three steps. She sustained only minor bruises. Julie K. injured her knee and suffered some road rash, and was later transferred to a hospital by the emergency services. She was diagnosed with a minor sprain and was back home in a matter of hours.

Curtain opens onto a modern flat: white walls, plenty of lights and open spaces. There are a bathroom and a bedroom to the right side of a central corridor with a nearly-empty coat rack directly behind the front door. To the other side there are a kitchen and a living room. The living room, farthest away from the bathroom, is clean but messy: numerous books and bundles of paper are strewn about. The rest of the flat is both clean and tidy.

I co-wrote this story with a fourteen-year-old girl. I’m quite chuffed with how it turned out. It’s entertaining. It’s well-written. It has an interesting protagonist. And above all: it keeps making unexpected turns. It’s a good story, even if I say so myself. I’m proud of this one. I really am.

Please note that this is just the three first pages of the story. If you want to read the rest (an additional 5 pages), PM me and I’ll send you a pdf version.

Fair warning:  Most of this is probably going to change to some extent, but I didn’t want to waste my first scribblings on Ken, because I like the character.  So here’s a little previously-written bit of the story to do with Ken. 

 Â *****

Kenneth Chambers wasn’t happy. No, he was content, and for him that was better than happy. Happy people were always headed for a fall, and then they hit bottom. Ken had already hit bottom and knew what it looked like. It wasn’t as bad as people made out, but it wasn’t comfortable. So Ken had climbed up a little and levelled out where he felt comfortable. He didn’t care what anyone else thought.

It was rent day, and Ken had the money plus a little extra. He’d gotten paid for two repair jobs today, a lawnmower and an old air conditioner. If you knew what you were doing with a compressor and could still get your hands on some freon gas, you could make some money fixing air conditioners. That and the sale of a couple of dime bags of his herbal sideline had provided enough money for the rent and a supper of real food. In Ken’s view, “real food” was anything that you got from a diner or restaurant; then came “food”, which was generally microwaved, and finally the vast majority of his diet: granola, cereal, chips, donuts, etc., under the heading “something to eat”. But tonight it would be real food, after he’d settled the rent with Jimmy Ruger. The rent was always Ken’s first priority and the only thing he accepted as a requirement or responsibility. After all, a man’s home is only his castle until he gets kicked out, which was also why Ken was careful to keep his sideline out of Jimmy’s sight. Jimmy might have a suspicion, but if Ken got stupid enough to make it obvious, then he would deserve to get kicked out.

This man’s castle was approximately the size of a two car garage, but half again as long. Ken lived in the same mini-warehouse where he worked. That was the one thing Jimmy didn’t give him shit about, because he saw it as getting a night watchman for free. Ken got up, picked up the faded beach chair he’d been sitting in and stepped through the open garage door into the first of two rooms, his workshop, where he kept whatever small engines or appliances he was working on. The other was a living area, furnished with a black leather sofa bed and armchair (you could get furniture that looked like new if you went around early enough. It was amazing what some people threw away.) The battered refrigerator in the corner with the portable television on top, however, argued that you can’t get everything for nothing. Ken’s choice of coffee table, an old wooden cable spool three feet wide replied that some people don’t want everything. Contrasting with the decor, however, Ken’s habits were quite neat and he maintained some hygeinic standards. He wasn’t sure whether Jimmy knew that he had plumbed the old cracked sink next to the fridge. Of course Ken had a key to the bathroom at the end of his building, which was also equipped with a small shower. Ken wasn’t surprised by this, he figured either this was Jimmy’s way of avoiding installing emergency eyewash stations, or he may have had some idea of putting a meter on it and charging.

Ken stepped through the doorway in the divider into his apartment and washed up at the sink. His face was well-hidden under his unruly black hair and full beard (not quite so black anymore), revealing only a perfectly triangular nose, two surprisingly lively brown eyes and perhaps a few extra lines. He looked in the mirror of the medicine chest above the sink and thought perhaps he looked like a little like a young Jerry Garcia. Yeah, that wouldn’t be too bad. Again, he didn’t care what anyone else thought. He gave a few half-hearted tugs at his hair and beard with his comb, replaced it in his pocket, and left to go see Jimmy Ruger, Grade A asshole.

Ken didn’t dislike Jimmy, not at all. He figured that the word asshole, like stupid, sometimes wasn’t an insult, it just denoted a fact of life. So while some people were stupid, Jimmy was an asshole. Ken supposed that the biggest symptom of this was that Jimmy liked to give people shit for no reason. He didn’t think he’d seen Jimmy actually mad about anything more than four times in the five years he’d been living there. No, Jimmy was at his happiest when giving people shit, and today was no exception. “You’re just in fucking time, you. One more day and I coulda told you to go find a carboard box. So how are ya anyway?”

“I’m fine, and you oughta stop advertising your competitors like that,” Ken growled amiably. “Here’s your rent. So how’s it going?”

“Yeah, yeah, it’s fine, business is good. Or it will be when that dickweed in B-12 gets out, that fucker’s costing me a fortune in electricity. And everything magically fucking breaks in his bay, ain’t nothing his fault. I gotta justify this shit to the old man, and… whoa, d’you feel that?”

Of course Ken had felt it. A tremor in the ground, not much, but enough to make him grab the counter to steady himself. There’d been a few of those tremors in the past month, and lots of speculation. “So you figure we’re gonna get an earthquake or something?”

“Nah, they said in the paper it was something that happens every 10,000 years or something. Here.” Jimmy reached under the counter and held out the paper, topping it with a scribbled receipt, “I’m done with it.”

“Thanks, see ya later.” Ken stepped through the door and looked back. “Hey, you might wanna take a look around, make sure all that shakin’ didn’t break anything.” He grinned. It got the desired reaction.

“Don’t you fuckin‘ jinx me like that, you prick! Of all the f—” The closing door cut off Jimmy’s rant. Always leave ‘em cheerful.

Ken stepped back out into the warm afternoon, sparing a glance for the gigantic entrance sign for Ruger Warehouse and Storage Facilities, and strolled back to his warehouse. Ruger Warehouse of course didn’t mean Jimmy. The complex belonged to his old man, Sol Ruger, who was enjoying a healthy retirement on the profits. He paid Jimmy well enough for managing the place and doing all the work, but Ken gathered from the way Jimmy talked that old Sol wasn’t likely to give him a share of the profits in this lifetime, so Jimmy just had to keep totin‘ that bale as an employee until he got his inheritance. Well, Ken supposed, it wasn’t such a mystery how Jimmy got to be the way he was.

Ken tucked the paper under his arm and set out down the street. If he was quick, he could grab dinner at the diner.