A girl. She liked dogs, had a puppy once. It was a good puppy, grew big, bigger than she. It was a good dog. The girl loved Dog. Dog licked her face. She licked the dog.
“Don’t do that,” her mother said.
The girl obeyed her mother.
Mother taught the dog to watch the door—all day, watch the door. Dog was watching the door, and a man came in. Dog attacked the man: bit his leg, bit his hand, bit his crotch, tore it out, let him bleed. Mother rewarded him with steak and all sorts of loves.
Dog barked at other dogs. He was protective of his three-year-old girl. Girl loved him. He loved her. Home was good, he got to be with Girl. At night, Dog slept with Girl. Girl held dog; he knew she was safe. He made sure she slept safe.
Mother took Dog to obedience training. Put him in a pen, taught it “bite,” taught it “tear.” He was obedient. He bit good. He tore better.
“Good boy!”
He got head pet.
“Good boy!”
He got steak.
One day, a bigger pen with a bigger dog, a scary dog. Dog bit the bigger dog, tore the bigger dog. Bigger dog didn’t get up.
“Good boy!”
He got steak.
Was happy to see his girl when he got home. Slept well those nights.
Dog went to more pens, bigger pens. More people came then, brought their dogs. Other dogs knew “bite” and “tear” too. Tried to bite Dog. Dog got angry—bit all dogs, tore all dogs. Some people got mad, some people did not.
Dog got steak. Went home to Girl, licked her face. He loved Girl.
One day, Dog go to pen. Pen has Girl in it. He happy to see Girl. He run to be with her. Leash holds him back.
Must get to her. He loves her! He loves her!
She is crying, lost. She holds a silver stick.
His handler lets him pull closer to girl, can almost reach her. He tries to lick her face.
“Stab,” Mother says.
Girl cries, drops stick. Mother puts stick back in Girl’s hand.
“Stab!”
Girl cries.
Mother slaps.
“What is stab,” Dog asks. “What is stab?”
“Stab,” Mother says.
Girl cries.
“Just stab,” Dog says. “You get steak.”
Dog’s leash yanks.
“Bite,” Handler says.
“Bite,” Dog asks. “Nothing to bite. No dogs to bite.”
“Bite,” Handler says.
“Stab,” Mother says and slaps Girl.
Dog angry. “Don’t hit Girl. Stop that! Stop that!”
“Bite,” Handler says.
“But nothing to bite,” Dog says.
“Stab,” Mother says. And she helps Girl lift the shiny stick over Dog and pokes down on him.
“Ow,” dog says. “That hurts.”
He nips at Girl.
“I’m sorry,” He says immediately.
“Stab,” Mother says.
Girl stabs!
Excerpt 2
In the beginning, darkness was upon the face of the deep. Then God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. Angels cheered. The devil frowned. The blind man cried out, “What in the hell?” Then God said, “It is beautiful,” and, his children committed him to the old folks home: refusing to visit, refusing to pay their bills and concurring that they had created all. There is a story about God escaping to visit his children, but they cried, “We don’t serve your kind here,” and he was forced to go home, where it is said that the city turned off his power and he now sits by candlelight that he presses himself—and that’s okay, because He still loves everyone. For that, his children are grateful, so long as it doesn’t interfere with their own agendas. Thus their stubbornness has played a vital role in helping them become adept at navigating the dark.
Thalia prayed. She hadn’t before, never had a reason to, but now she did because she couldn’t see. She prayed to get her way, to find her way, to make her own way, and deep down she knew that she would stop praying the moment she was out of these tunnels. After all, why pray when one can already see or thinks one can see? As the story goes, God healed the blind to see, and the blind said, “Work your own corner, or I’ll gut you like a fish.”
Excerpt three
The guard dropped a copy of Merle Dixon’s Huckleberry Finn: Revised on the metal shelf at Slieve’s feet. Slieve stared at the wall. He wanted to stay in that position, staring at the wall. The wall was his friend. It never betrayed him. Never asked him to swallow anything he didn’t want to.
He stared at the wall and pretended he could see the sun casting shadows of bars over it. The wall would have liked that. Slieve would have liked that. He was hungry but didn’t care and didn’t realize it. Did the wall know it? That he was hungry? Or did it know he had work to do?
Frank Lee Morris had escaped Alcatraz by digging a hole through the wall with a spoon, but Frank Lee Morris had a spoon to dig a hole to escape through.
A rat appeared in the sunlight, not real, like the sun. He knew that. Stare at a wall long enough and you know what’s real and what’s not.
The guard searching through his open metal cabinet, flipped through his journal and ate one of his chips from a tiny bag.
“Your chips are stale,” Officer Felman said. “How old this is?”
“How old is this,” Slieve corrected.
“Scuse me?” Felman spilled the chips on the ground, stepped on them, kept digging through Slieve’s shelves.
Slieve turned his gaze to his ceiling and imagined there was some sort of light fixture hanging from it. Ted Bundy had escaped through a light fixture, but Ted Bundy had a light fixture to escape through.
“God, this room is stank,” Felman announced, mostly to get under Slieve’s skin. Felman was good at that.
Felman was kind of stupid though. His back was to Slieve. If Slieve had a gun, he could have used it to take Felman Hostage.
John Dillinger carved a fake gun out of soap or wood, or something like that, and marched his way right out of jail. John Dillinger had a knife though to cut that gun. Why didn’t he just use the knife to take a real gun from a guard?
Guess it could have been worse, he could have used the knife to carve another knife, but they probably didn’t make silver shoe polish back then to make the blade shiny. In any case, Slieve didn’t have dumb enough guards for that.
Why couldn’t he have dumb guards like Dillinger?
Felman turned to the bed and waved his fingers back at him.
“All right,” he said. “Up.”
Slieve rolled, sat, stood from the bed, and Felman peeled back the mattress.
“Something funny, offender,” Felman asked.
“No, officer,” Slieve lied and thought about the prisoner who had made nectarines look like grenades to escape prison, but Slieve had no nectarines.
“Hello,” Felman announced. “What we got here?”
He held up a crucifix on a piece of thread. Slieve had made it out of a napkin and spit. The thread was from his mattress and fairly strong.
“Crucifix,” Slieve replied.
“I can see what it is,” Felman replied. “You ain’t supposed to have it.”
“I can have a religious object so long as it doesn’t pose a security problem,” Slieve replied.
“Say who,” Felman asked.
“The Supreme Court of the United States.”
“You ain’t in the Supreme Court. You in prison, and this offensive. You know you can’t have anything offensive. You got reprogram.”
Excerpt Four
Dwayne was to his feet and already out of the kitchen. By the time Amy and Diana had joined him, he was peering through the plastic blinds in the front room. It was still light enough to see, but only barely. Six cars drove into the street and blocked its thoroughfare. A small female officer stood at one blockade, a tall man took up the other. Several more rushed the front yard across the road.
“It’s Paul,” Dwayne said.
Diana started for the front door, but Dwayne restrained her.
“Don’t assume they’ll wait to hear you out,” Dwayne said. “Remember Torres. Wait for them to come here.”
Diana loathingly agreed and returned to peering through the blinds.
The officers moved towards the house across the street from theirs. They knocked, knocked again. When a thin man in his sixties answered his door, four officers forced their way in.
“Did they find it,” Amy asked.
They continued to watch in silence, barely breathing. Minutes passed. The thin man stumbled back out of his doorway, his hands cuffed. He screamed, begged, tried to run back to the house. He fell.
The russet Albrecht upright piano squirmed from within the house, following two officers. The antique dropped over the lip of the entry way. Its hidden strings screamed for mercy. Its spruce soundboard cracked. The Maple frame snapped along the top edge.
The officers continued to push the object out of the house until the other side dropped, crying even louder than before. A front leg sprained, and its brass wheel popped like a tiddlywink out into the street. The officers grouped behind the piano and bullied it over the front steps where it fell and regaled one last requiem, it’s own.
The skinny man screamed, tears appeared to fall from his lips. His face turned red then blue, under the bright porch light, from the inability to breathe through his torment.
Two officers approached the piano with sledgehammers. They drew their heavy black heads and let them fall against the Albrecht’s flesh, and they continued to let them rise and fall until all that remained was a pile of splinters and steel strings.
Paul was released and cited for operating a piano in a noise enforced zone without a license and for promoting anti-STEM values through simply owning it. The officers broke away from each other and set towards the neighboring houses.
“Here they come,” Dwayne said.
The three returned to the kitchen table and began to sullenly pretend to be eating their dinner.
The doorbell chimed.
Dwayne stood and walked to the front door, opened it and greeted a stern officer who was two heads shorter than he.
“Sir,” she said. “We’re just checking with the residents in the area. Do you mind if I ask you some questions?”
“Well, we’re having dinner just n—
The officer pressed her way into the house.
“Were you aware your neighbor had a device of artistic design without a permit to offend,” she asked.
“You don’t say,” Dwayne said.
“You never heard him playing?”
“No, can’t say that I did. Di?”
“No,” Diana replied. “Never.”
The officer pressed into the kitchen and seemed to inspect the dinner. Her eyes fell on Amy.
“You both live here?”
“No,” Amy replied. “I live next door.”
The officer spoke into her headset to let other officers know that Amy’s house was empty. “We need to search your home ma’am.”
“I beg your pardon,” Amy asked.
“With one device in the area, it’s quite possible others may be around as well.”
“You don’t think a band, do you,” Amy asked in forced shock. “In our town?”
They often operate in groups,” the officer said
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Thank you for posting about The Exodus, this sounds like a story that I will enjoy reading
ReplyDeleteThis sounds like a very interesting read!
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