Arioso

   Frank Opaloch sits down in his huge, midnight-black arm chair that rests square in the middle of his study. The burgundy walls and carpet perfectly accent the chair and give the room a dark, yet oddly serene, feel. Bach's Arioso play's over the small speakers at every corner of the room. First editions and rare copies of every kind of literature imaginable adorn the walls on six mahogany shelves. In between the shelves, art from some of times most accomplished artists ornament the otherwise bare space. The wall without shelves contains a cleverly concealed door which blends right into the rest of the wall.

   Two pedestals stand directly in front of the wall. On one, a rare edition of Dante Alighieri's epic poem, Divine Comedy in its original Italian, lays suspended inside a glass case. On the other is a small pendant that also seemingly hovers inside of a glass case. The pendant is simple and plain, made up of a silver capsule and a dog-tag style chain. A small amount of liquid fills the inside of the capsule and in the liquid a bubble of air is held captive. There is a small plaque on the pedestal that reads, "Kristine".

   Frank sips a bit a champagne from a long, elegant glass and relaxes a little, falling deeper into the plush chair. This is his place of solitude and of rest where he can forget the world, if only for a little while. Being a multi-millionaire isn't as easy as most people think. Despite being only forty-seven, he looks more like sixty something. Unlike many of his fellow millionaires, he controlled his company. He didn’t just play golf while some punk kid ran his business into the ground. From an early age, Frank knew he had to maintain control.

   He had been bullied, abused, taken advantage of, and lied to as a child. As he grew up, he was always told he’d never amount to anything. He was always told that Frank Opaloch would remain unknown, part of the masses, and forgotten. He had proven them wrong. Every last one of them. Some of them, he had even stepped on on his way to the top, and he relished every second of it.

   Kristine had been the only person who ever believed in him. Kristine, his beloved wife had supported him all the way. She fought along side him and kept him sane. She was his sunshine, his guiding light. She never left his side, until she was torn away by a coworker driving home drunk after a late office party. Frank liked to think she never saw his coming, that it had been quick, and that he who had taken Kristine from him burned in hell for the crime.

   Frank isn’t a vengeful man by any means. He always keeps a cool head, rarely ever succumbing to emotion. That’s what this room was for. A single tear tumbles down his wrinkled, wise face. He didn’t wipe it away, choosing instead to let it run it’s course. The tear felt odd to him, like something that simply shouldn’t be. There was no room for tears. There never had been. Even in this semi-fortress of solitude, he had to keep himself as composed as ever. He didn’t want to admit it, and no one knew it, but he was much to fragile to let emotions take hold.

   A small, electric beep lets him know someone is invading his cocoon. When the secret door opens, the lights return to full strength and the music stops. A wiry young man stands in the doorway, carrying Frank’s attaché case and the day’s schedule. Sighing, Frank set’s his glass aside and stands up, his joints cracking with age. Turning to the young man, he asks him to leave the case and schedule and leave. Nervously, the man complies and Frank is once again alone.

   Straightening his tie, adjusting his shirt, and donning his nearby suit jacket, Frank looks as naturally presentable as ever. Snatching the schedule up from the case, he quickly peruses it. Nodding in approval, he picks up his case and begins to head for the door. On his way out, he stops to lay a gentle hand on Kristine’s glass case. For a moment, but only for a moment, his eyes well with tears once more at the thought of her. Bowing his head, he whispers “I love you” , and he leaves the room. As soon as he’s gone, the doors close once more. In the dark, a faint but noticeable scurry is the only warning before a horrible, sourceless wail tears through the silence. Somewhere in the darkness, a woman who isn’t there mourns for the tortured soul of her beloved husband.

"I love you too."

Johnny, I Hardly Knew Ya — Part One

   “I wish somebody had told me, you know? If somebody had just stepped in and said something, anything, none of this would be happening.” 

   The tired, downtrodden voice traveled across the bar. For the good part of an hour, I had been mostly ignoring it, choosing instead to focus on the drink in front of me. As far as I could tell, the source of the voice was just another one of us down and out losers, talking in hopes that somebody would actually listen to him for once in his life. It wasn’t that I didn’t care what the man was saying. I just had my own problems to worry about, just like everyone else at the bar. The man wasn’t really even talking to me. More at me, than anything. But something he said about half-way through his depressing monologue caught my attention. He mentioned guns, and lot of them. After that, the monologue turned into a Michael Bay movie. 

   Guns don’t interest me—I don’t even like guns—but the chance that I may have stumbled upon something illegal was too much to pass up. The monotony of day-to-day life is often broken up by the bizarre and taboo. While gun smuggling was nothing terribly outlandish in a world of endless action movies and cop dramas, it was certainly something new in my treadmill life. 

   My life wasn’t anything terribly difficult, just dull. Working a desk job isn’t so bad, until you fall into a routine. Once that happens, you’re doomed to live every day the same as the last. Over and over and over again. Then, one day, you walk in to find a seemingly harmless envelope on your desk. You open it, expecting some complaint about you not putting a cover sheet on your TPS report, only to find a nice little pink slip. Add a messy divorce from your psychotic wife and the fact that your bother is involved in some sort of cult on top of getting fired, and your life really starts to look rough. 

   Like all losers, especially the recently unemployed kind, my first instinct was to flop into the nearest bar and make like a fish. Soon after, though I didn’t seem him come in, a string-bean of a twenty-something kid flounders over to the bar. At first he seems calm enough despite his incessantly tapping foot, keeping to himself outside of a quiet “Hey” as he sits down. The façade doesn’t last long, though, and within minutes and about two drinks, he’s reduced to a hunched over, nervous wreck of a man. 

   “This whole thing is just... a lack of communication, y’know? I’m new to this sorta thing. I don’t run guns. I’m not a criminal. I wasn’t looking for trouble. But my brother, big man that he is, gets involved in this smuggling operation. He tells me all about it, going on and on about how he’s going to be making big money now and all this stuff. Now, I wasn’t sure if he was serious. I mean, he makes ‘jokes’ like this all the time. So, I kinda tell one of my friends about the whole thing, right? Turns out, he tells a friend who goes and tells the cops. They think it’s real. The big twist ending is, it is real. My brother’s big operation gets stomped by the cops. He makes it out okay but they lose all the merchandise and a couple of his guys. So, now he’s coming after me. Me, his own brother! How was I supposed to know that he was serious, huh? I thought it was just a joke! He was drunk when he told me, and I wasn’t even the one to tell the cops, man. But he’s coming for me. Or, somebody is. I think it’s him, but... I don’t know. Whoever it is, they mean business. They’ve already killed my friend and the guy that went to the cops. I guess all I’m trying to say is that I’m scared, y’know? I’m scared.” 

   When his story was finished, he downed the contents of the shot glass in front of him and turned to leave after dropping far too much money for the drinks. Putting a hand on my shoulder, he gives me some advice without even looking at me. 

   “I’m not sure you were even listening to me, but thank you. I needed someone to tell me story to. I everything works out for you, whoever you are. Just remember to watch whatcha say, alright? You never know who’s listening.” 

   With that, he walks away without even telling his name. As he leaves, I consider stopping him and finding out more, maybe offering to help. But, deciding it’d be better for me to just stay out of it, I turn back to the bar. The ringing of the bell attached to the door announces his departure. Suddenly, tires screech outside and a dull thud sends me running for the door. I don’t know what made me run. Maybe I had cared about the man’s story more than I thought. Maybe I felt guilty for not having stopped him. Whatever the reason, I ran as if my own life depended on it. 

   Outside, a crowd had already begun to gather. In the midst of them all lay the virtually unrecognizable corpse of the man I barely knew. Clutched in the remains of his left hand lay his mahogany two-fold wallet, stained with blood and brake fluid. Picking it up I flip it open, revealing his driver’s license. Johnny. Johnny Hawkins. 

   Staring at the license, I reach for my phone to call 911. Realizing I left it at the bar and notice the twelve other people with their phones already out, I sigh and head back inside. Unsurprisingly, my phone is gone. Sitting back at the bar, I take another look at the wallet in my hand. 

   “Johnny, I hardly knew ya.”

Writers Block

“I don’t know what to write. I’m supposed to be doing a paper on blood revenge for Mrs. Parks’s fifth period English, but I’m drawing a blank. Damn you, Writers Block.  You are the bane of my lowly existence. I hope you’re happy.

I don’t even know what else to say to you. That’s how badly you’re jammed me up. I can’t even curse you, because you’ve robbed me of my ability to write. What is it about you that makes this so hard? Is it me, rather than you? Is there some sort of chemical imbalance, some sort of mental deficiency that prevents me from writing? Or, are you really just some evil force that lurks within us all?

We all, at some point, suffer from Writers Block. A lot of us have found some sort of cure, ranging from coffee to a favorite movie, death metal to chocolate. The “cures” are all manner of things, and all supposedly work. I’ve tried a great many myself, yet have been unsuccessful thus far. I haven’t quit searching; I will destroy you, Writers Block, someday. But I can’t wait for an easy cure. I need to write now, whether you like it or not. So, here’s me. I’m calling you out, Old West-style. We’re going to end this, once and for all. Hello. My name is Garrett Chandler. You killed my writing. Prepare to die.”

- Two Days Later -

Breaking news! Local teen, Garrett Chandler, was found dead in his Fruit Heights home early this morning by a jogger. What the jogger was doing in his house, we don’t know. But, since they always find the bodies anyways, we’ll let it slide. It’s their thing. What we do know is that Garrett appears to have gone insane and killed himself by, somehow, exploding his mind. All over the house are the initials W.B. written in blood, though we are unsure of who that is at this point. Oddly enough, various pieces of Garrett’s writing were found strewn about the house, leading the investigators to believe that he somehow drove himself insane, The Shining-style. More on this hilarious story on the nine o’ clock news!