The future of my futures.

On the future that could have been:
I can't help thinking that if I hadn't broken up with BF, I'd still have access to hot shower water.
On the very near future:
"Hey, Miss Insomnia, are you insomnia'd now?"
On my future career:
Apparently a short story about a suicidal superhero is heavy stuff. But do they like it?

On my other future career:
Maybe they'll delay the governor inuaguration, too. This is South Carolina; NOBODY can handle snow even when it doesn't stick, and this shit's been hanging out since Sunday.
No, I don't have anything better to do than sit on my student email and refresh it for a couple hours to see what my terrifyingly competent professor (so described because it's also terrifying how competent he expects us to be) comes up with in the way of online meetings and/or "Guys, just read the syllabus and schedule. That should bring you up to date. Fresh batteries for your interviewing recorders tomorrow and fresh buttons for your interview pants, okay?"
Except watch the new episode of Greek, but I can do both at the same time.

On the future of this blog: I plan on tracking my breakup rehab, bouts of lonley bored depression, and sex life here until I get into a new Relationship. Capital R, see, to denote the smushy romantic connection the thought of which currently makes me gag and reach for a drink. I am not ready to join those ranks again. I won't be for...well, fuck knows when but it'll be awhile. 
Other people being together are so cute, though.

Random tangent time!
JAZZ MUSIC. I grasp onto you as something my ex loves but I have no idea why. I don't understand. I can't tell you apart, except when you're ragtime and then you're awesome but then you're not really jazz anymore. Otherwise, you're elevator music that makes me wonder how such a sophisticated type of music with such a complicated chord system and theoretical underpinnings can be so damn boring.
BF, together we were probably the whitest couple on the planet, but thank you for also loving hiphop (let's be honest, you had me at The Grey Album) and helping me avoid Journey as much as possible to keep my blood pressure down.

Breaking news (but no more bad puns).

The Good

• I'M GETTING PUBLISHED. Sorry for getting all caps lock shouty, but hot damn I got the best phone call of my life on the night of the 17th. Alligator Juniper is publishing the two short stories I sent them for their 2011 new writers contest. No victory lap around the campus game room like I did when I found out I landed last summer's internship, but that was only because this time I was at home and it was 11pm and I had to go tell my parents why I woke them up (answer: victory shout).
  They emailed me my Publishing Contract yesterday. I'm signing it, scanning it, sending it back today. I will be a published author before I graduate college, with eight whole contributors' copies that I've already mentally handed out (Mom and Dad, Mike, high school newspaper teacher, New York writing friend, North Carolina writing friend, guitar teacher, Stephen King, me).
  Major life goal: check. And the best part? It's awesome and doesn't have anything to do with boys.
  
  • And as a happy little footnote, I was in the middle of writing a superhero story when the science fiction magazine I submitted to six weeks ago emailed me a reminder that they're still accepting submissions and they liked my writing. Would I like to try again?
    Yes. Yes I would.
• Also good but having everything to do with boys was when Bluetooth told me, during a scattered texting conversation, he got me a Christmas present. Set aside the fact that I hope he's just using me for sex because that's what I'm using him for: aw. That's sweet. So I said I had something (small, non-fancy) for him, too, and then the next time I went to Kroger I stood in the home shit aisle debating whether a plain white candle in a plain glass holder would be considered manly enough to give a guy who said one of the reasons he loves living off campus is because he can light candles in his own damn room. I added a three-position lighter (vaguely suggestive, adds more to the pyromaniac angle) and called it good.
  "Trust your instincts--they're spot on."
• Kanye West's new album. It's amazing and doesn't remind me of BF at all. 
• I made three As, one B, and one B+ this semester.

The Bad

•  I have ten-hour days to look forward to for my print journalism senior semester that starts in a week and a half. We're running our own paper, five days a week, and I'm terrified.
• BF still won't talk to me. I understand; at this point I don't even think I've ever had anything legitimate to tell him since we broke up. But it's really depressing, especially when my dad says it's weird we're together almost three years and just cut off contact like we did. Like BF did. I know, Dad, and it makes me feel like a helpless bitch.
• Bluetooth hasn't texted or answered the two texts (both last night) I've sent him the past few days. Again my brain jumps before it looks all the fucking time, so I'm half convinced he's gone back to his ex or found other better sex and just doesn't want to tell me while my other half (generally the bottom half) keeps reminding me that he's used phrases such as "next time" and "sleep over" and "I can never have a one-night stand" (although that was more of a physical reference, I think) and we both have those goddamn Christmas gifts (unless he's lying about all that! shrieks my top half) to exchange. Maybe his phone broke.
  This is when I realize I've gone through this cycle at least twice in the past month and as long as I know and want to have sex with him, I will want to strangle him because of his uneven attention.
  Once again, the plan is to call him when I get back to campus. See if he wants what I do. Make and eat enchiladas and strawberry pie with or without him, regardless of outcome. 
• I'm worried about my friends.

The Weird

• I had a wet dream about my hot Greek reporting professor last night. It involved volunteering to go on assignment with him somewhere we had to wear asbestos suits, and cunnilingus. I'm not sure in what order.
  ...Yeah, that's been the weirdest part of break so far. Not as weird as my first wet dream, which was about Bill Clinton and woke me up with a wedgie so far up my ass I thought could taste cotton.

Tonight I'm getting squiffy off a single-serving bottle of shitty wine from Wal-Mart. It's a combination celebration/trying to forget and move on ritual.

Another one.

From another science fiction editor of the same magazine:

I'm going to pass on this one, but it was very close.

I love the basic idea. I've even written something similar myself.

However I do see two basic problems. Firstly I'd expect there to be something different about Michael that gave Angie at least a few clues early on. If Michael's supposed to be an experiment I'd not expect him to work perfectly at the first attempt.

Secondly I don't like the overdose as an ending. I'd sooner that she came up with a better plan.

Please keep writing and submit again. I love your ideas and want to see more.

A few things from Your Author:
1. Yes, I stole Mike's name.
2. Hmm. The editor's right about the experiment thing, but this was stealth beta testing. Nobody was suppose to figure it out, especially the other extras.
3. The overdose is of sleep-to-dream serum, so she's not killing herself, just putting herself in a permanent dream state.
But they want more. I think I might like writing a hero-based story instead of stumbling around in mumblecore literary fiction all the time.
Oh, and here's the synopsis of the story I sent in so you know what the hell I'm talking about:

Dream extra for hire Angie becomes obsessed with another extra, Michael, who keeps populating the same dreams she does. Frustrated at her inability to ignite their relationship as a bit player, she works overtime to earn enough money to become a client and gain complete control. While looking for him in their real-world compound, she stumbles onto his face in a computer program that is beta testing robotic avatars meant to phase out human extras. Shocked at first, she then takes an overdose of her remaining dream placement serum to stay with him in the only way she knows how.

Rejection from the outside.

This is the body of an email I got yesterday:

Thank you for submitting your manuscript. If Angie were trying to rise above her confining, tawdry situation to find a living man, perhaps the model for Michael, if she put herself at risk to escape obsessions and other people's dreams, I would be interested in your story. I want to see stories where the characters rise above, grow, take risks to achieve something worthwhile, try their best, recover their souls. When we write about someone sinking down into oblivion, some of our own self sinks, something in the reader sinks too.
You write well. Please consider what I've said when writing your future stories, and I will be happy to read them.

So, my short story "Sleep to Dream" (yes, I named it after the Fiona Apple song) got rejected because the main character didn't stop being depressing. Huh.
You know, I think I can live with that. It's not poor construction; they just don't like the material I used. 

Hurt My Boy

I wrote this short story yesterday.

"Hurt My Boy"

She hurt my boy two weeks ago. Broke his heart and stomped--

Mom. Stop.

--on the pieces. What? That's what happened, isn't it?

I don't want to talk about it.

I know, dear. I know.

We've been talking about it for two weeks. Can we just—not?

Okay. Okay. I'll leave you alone.

You don't have to go anywhere, just...

But I do have to go out of the room, leave him on his side of the couch. It's gone a little squishier around him since that Tuesday. When he gets up for work or food or the toilet, the suede puckers reach up to grab him back in. If I stay I'll notice that, and I'll say something, or at least think something loud enough to bother him.

It's better to give him quiet, so I go upstairs.

The first week, she called his cell phone. Now he keeps that off and upstairs, and she calls the house. He never answers it. That's my job.

No, I say into the receiver. Not here. I don't know when.

He stares harder at his laptops I hang up. Who was--

No one. For Liz.

Like hell it was! Liz is folded next to her brother like a gargoyle, all folded legs and arms and startled eyes. She knows too much. Why didn't you hand it over?

Telemarketer.

Liz punched my boy on the arm. Tell your nutter to fuck off.

She's not mine.

Anymore, I almost add out loud. Horrified, I pick up the remote and start flipping. Liz.

What? Did we stop practicing the First Amendment around here without my knowledge?

Yes, dear.

I need to know these things, Ma. She stands up, leans over and headbutts her brother. I gotta go do my fornicating homework. Can I borrow his car tomorrow night?

Hey! He doesn't move. His face stays round and set.

Where are you going that's so damn important?

That does it. He crumbles.

Liz...

Liz looks suddenly worried. She leans down again and hugs her brother's neck. I'm sorry. I didn't mean it like that. Want to come with me? 

No.

I'm sorry. I didn't mean it like that. Want to come with me?

I liked her. She was sweet. She seemed so happy with him. I was going to--

Mom. Don't.

Don't what?

You know. We talked about it last month. What you were going to do.

On the side of my chair that he can't—won't—see, I tip one of my knitting needles until the red stitches fell unraveled into a basket. She liked red. Still liked it, maybe.

So. Any weekend plans?

He shakes his head.

He use to spend the whole weekend with her, packing his suitcase and trailing it behind him like a tourist looking for the right gate at an airport. He would come back Sunday evenings, sometimes for dinner and sometimes not, usually smelling like her shampoo and always smiling. Liz would bait him and he'd let it flow off him into a bad pun.

That's what I miss the most. That's what I hate her for—she stole his sense of humor.

She can keep that. Liz leans across me to open the refrigerator. 

Can you get me a diet Coke from the back, dear?

Liz squints. You're closer.

Please?

Okay okay okay. She grabbed two, opened one with a chewed fingernail, and handed it over. Cold enough? Should I go grab some snow?

He hasn't moved, Liz. 

It's winter. Nobody's suppose to move.

But he's—inert. Depressed. I don't think he's gotten off the couch in--

About an hour and a half. He was taking a piss when I went to steal his laptop. I put it back before he noticed. He takes a really long time in the bathroom, ever notice that? 

No, dear. I can't say that I have.

I'm just saying that's probably more worrisome than whatever this girl did to him.

How can you say that, Liz? He's...

He'll get over it. 

Liz...

He will. The batshit crazy ones are always the easiest to get over. And she's batshit, Ma. Liz took a long swallow. I don't know what she took of his—essence, or whatever, but it's gone and probably for the better because if that piece of insanity and booze wanted it, it couldn't've been good for him. You know?

She wasn't that bad, Liz.

Liz shrugs. I'm trying to be supportive.

Did you say booze?

Liz shrugs again.

Liz. Did she get your brother into trouble with alcohol?

Liz smiles. See? Now you hate her, too. 

And I do. God help me, but I do. She hurt my boy. What else can I do?

THE END