McCutcheon new Story

[Guest]

Just in time foe the summer music festivals. Here is a short story, under 1,000 words. I made it short on purpose because most of my short stories are too long to be published. Anyway feed back would be gtreat. But no voting on it because I get posted no matter what anyone thinks. Lucky me.



Kiss Off
By McCutcheon


The day I learned to hate another human being started like any other day that summer. We were hanging out on Greg's front lawn practicing our Karate Kid moves. Greg's older brother had just passed his drivers test. He was going to borrow his mother's car and take us to Summer Fest.

Summer Fest is located on Milwaukee's lakefront and has the distinction of being the biggest music festival in the world, if not the best. Most of the bands are local bar acts that play working class, third rate Bruce Springsteen songs. The bands get the audience they deserve. You ever see those Milwaukee Brewer's baseball hats with beer cup holders on the side, and a long tube attached that runs along the helmet and fits into your mouth so you can suck two beers at once as you walk, leaving your hands free to grope female buttocks? If I had to guess, I'd say those hats were invented at Summer Fest.

My friends and I were going to see the Violent Femmes. The group had gone to a high school in our district. My friends didn't like the Femmes as much after their second album Hallowed Ground. But I loved it. Sure, it didn't have the instant teenage angst classics of the first album, but it had a dark evil side. Hallowed Ground taught me there was more to pop than just having fun. This was Poe poetry set to music. I couldn't wait.

Four of us were going that day, Greg, Eric, Carl and me. Eric had snuck some booze from his parent's liquor cabinet. He filled a two-liter Dr. Pepper bottle with a few ounces of everything until it was full. It was a strong concoction.

When we got to the festival we had a few hours to wait until the Femmes went on. We bought sodas for a mixer and went to the waterfront to sit on the big rocks over looking Lake Michigan. After a half hour three girls came and sat with us.

We shared our drinks. The girls started to pair off. This is when the problem began to arise. There were only three of them and four of us. Somebody was going to be left out of the anticipated make-out session.

That summer I was hopelessly in love with Elisabeth Shue, but I was willing to cheat on my true love for the chance of feeling my first tit. I swilled the potent drink and prayed I would be chosen. To me this was far more important then the humility of being picked last for dodge ball. I put my trembling hands in my pockets and played it cool.

One of the girls sat down next to me. She was the cutest of the three, a black girl with the whitest teeth, huge eyes and a budding woman's figure covered only by halter-top and shorts.

“Hiya.� She said. “My name is Halle.�

“Hi.� I said.

“This drink is strong,� she said smiling at me. “I'm getting tipsy.�

I couldn't believe my luck. But before our lips could meet, before my fingers could cup a breast, Carl came up from behind me and lifted up my shirt. He said, “Don't kiss that slob, he is fat.�

I looked down, and sure enough there was a layer of baby fat hanging over my waistline. I sucked in my gut as fast as I could. But it was too late. It didn't matter that I wasn't that fat, or that I wanted to be with Halle more than Carl. The gesture was complete. Carl got the laughs and the girl.

I sulked off on my own. I skipped the concert and cried in a port-potty as drunk older men banged on the fiberglass walls and threatened to tip it over if I didn't get the hell out of there and let them piss. I rode a bus home. It took four transfers and three hours.

I am not a good person. That day should have made me stronger, given me a hero's resolve. I should have risen above it all. But I didn't. Instead I vowed revenge.

A decade later Carl was getting married. The night before his wedding he was out celebrating with the boys. I went home early to crash on Carl's sofa bed. The ten years difference hadn't left us with much in common. Greg, Eric, and Carl never left Wisconsin, while I had been traveling the world.

Carl's fiancée was home when I got in. She was drinking and I joined her. We shared a few beers. She opened her heart to me and told me her fears. I had met her for the first time that afternoon. Before I knew it we were kissing; long smoldering kisses with tongue. Then we had a quick fuck without a condom. I came inside her. She gathered her clothes and went to bed.

I sat in the dark kitchen drinking beer. It must have been last minute jitters on her part. But I didn't stop it, even though she was ugly and I wasn't attracted to her.

The next day was the wedding. The ceremony passed without incident. The couple exchanged vows. Carl consummated his marriage with sloppy seconds. I never saw Carl, or his wife, ever again.

[mccutcheon]

Guest my ass. This thing never let's me log in.

[martino]

i can never log in on your new york scribbles pages, so i know how you are feeling...

this is a nifty little story of sloppy revenge and hating your hometown. i like it.

you may want to re-write the bit about the beer contraption (is it a helmet, or is it a baseball hat?). otherwise, i like the spirit within.

just like i thoroughly enjoy the new york scribbles, by the way...

[mccutcheon]

Danke. Re-write it in German and have it take place at a beer fest in Muinch. AH ah ha. Prost!

[mccutcheon]

No one can get on NYC Scribbles because I don't want the thread ruined by certain unmentionables. And when I go back to edit and put it into a book I'll be able to just grab it all off the internet in order.

[Myke115]

Nice story ... you've got plenty of good short stories to do a collection. Even if you think they're to long (which I don't), instead of doing a collection of many stories one day, you could do a collection of just a few stories.

One of my favorite books in this vein is Stephen King's Different Seasons which included the story that became the movie "Stand by Me" and another that became "Shawshank Redemption". Easily some of King's best work. Take those longer stories and simply do what King did ... call them novellas!

[bfj]

Oh yes, I have head this story before. One of the first nights we hung out, on our way to Madison to see Kate, maybe to shoot part of that movie. Yeah that was it. Good story but I'd like to have at least a description of his fiancee...why you were't attracted to her.

[mccutcheon]

thanks guys. I will work on it. I was trying to be as sparse as possiable. but I will add.

[marky]

Okay, now I'm mad. I've had to login twice now. I mean, I was logged in, I posted, then when I was ready to post again, I found I wasn't logged in. BASTARD! Am I gonna have to log in every time I post?

I like this story, too. McC, I think your writing may be improving. I'd just like to make a few suggestions (and you can of course, ignore them if you choose):

1) I'm pretty sure your use of the word "humility" is incorrect. You mean "humiliation".

2) "I went home early to crash on Carl's sofa bed." This sentence, placed where it was, really confused me for a moment. Where was home? Were you living with Carl? Were you living in some other city and went back to Wisconsin for the wedding? I tried to connect it up with the pre-wedding night out with the boys, but that didn't make sense either.

3) I think that to say the fiancee was ugly was superfluous. It would be fine just to take that out and leave the part that says "I found her unattractive". Also, although I wouldn't have thought of it until Burnt Face Jake said it, I wouldn't mind a description of her and why you didn't find her attractive, either.

4) Despite being delightfully humorous, the paragraph about the hats/helmets becomes a bit exclusive when it mentions "you" and "female buttocks". You shouldn't forget that it's quite possible your reader might be a female or a gay man. This might be fixed by perhaps taking out the word "female" or changing "female buttocks" to "body parts", and you'd lose nothing of the humor that way, either.

I realize with all this it must seem like I've totally picked it apart to death, but all in all, I was quite satisfied with this story, and as I said, your writing appears to have improved.
Good work my man!

[mccutcheon]

Marky, this is very helpful. I'll make some changes. I totally agree on the Carl's sofa couch thing.

[Maverick]

I agree, your stories are getting better. I like the helmet part though, very descriptive of the type of guy who would wear one. He'd be likely to be grabbing female buttocks after a few refills of his hat, and women and gay men know the type too...

I didn't even catch the bit about you not being attracted to the fiance at first, so maybe you should describe her, or I should read slower.

Good story!

[Sloth]

Hey Mc, to return the favor I found a typo:

"Have you ever see those Milwaukee"

[Sloth]

Also, this is a not really a story. This is autobiography isn't it?