a friend who doesn’t like batman. [trigger #150]

“Ha, you’re joking right? An entire week where someone isn’t bitching about the weather in Seattle, in one form or another? That’s never going to happen. I think people actually move here just to be allowed to complain about the weather. You could have four straight weeks of drought, followed by two days of rain, and when the sun came out on the third day, you’d have assholes lined up and down the street, proclaiming, ‘Well! What’s that thing up in the sky, that big round orange ball. It’s so warm. You never see that in Seattle.’

“A week without people complaining about the weather… pfff. You might as well say you were looking for sasquatch, or unicorns, or a friend of mine who doesn’t like Batman. You’re never, ever going to find it.”

you have fifty dollars to your name. [trigger #149]

Dear John,

I’m really sorry to do this by email, but I don’t want to see you anymore, not even long enough to break up with you. I’ve been putting this off for too long, and now I guess you’ll be paying for my procrastination with a hastily worded email telling you to get lost.

While you’re away on your trip east to visit your family, I’ll be moving everything I own out of our apartment. You don’t know this, but several months ago I put in for a transfer to another city. I’m not telling you what city, because I’d prefer you have a hard time finding me.

Sorry things didn’t work out, but I can’t imagine this is much of a surprise. You used to be going somewhere. You were passionate and adventurous, every minute with you was like some epic journey into excitement. Now, you’re as boring as fuck and I just can’t stand to look at you any more. You haven’t had a job in 10 months, so you just sit on the couch and flip through the channels all day in that disgusting Aerosmith t-shirt and those nasty old sweatpants with the hole in the crotch. You have $50 to your name, but that doesn’t seem to bother you, because you just keep leaching off of me. You also seemed to imply the other day that your older brother would be coming to live with us for a few months. Yet, he doesn’t have a job either, so I’m not sure what would change to end the ‘few months’ he’d be staying with us.

I’ve pre-paid the rent on the apartment for two months. That’s my little gift to you, for old times’ sake.

Anything that I’m not sure about as far as shared possessions goes, I’m leaving behind for you. It was that or burn it, so I figured it was kinder to let you have it.

Whew, anyway, have a nice life. I hope you get your shit together and find a better life. That’s exactly what I intend to do in the new city I’ll be calling my home.

Bye,

Jesse.

and then the fog rolled in. [trigger #148]

**continuation of #147**

When the first day of school finally did come, it quickly became clear to Eddie Falcone that Anna was still going ahead with her plan to sneak into the back of the creepily dark backyard. This meant that unless the dynamic of their relationship changed very much in the next few hours, he would be climbing the fence with her. His only consolation was that at least they were doing it in daylight. He’d be able to look out from the yard and see the sun, even if that sun’s light wasn’t reaching the backyard he followed Anna Booker into.

If he could have only fallen for someone else, perhaps he could do normal things. Maybe he’d be playing video games after school, or riding bikes, or any number of normal kid activities. Instead, he fell for Anna Booker. It’s always been Anna, from play dates as four-year-olds to their shared walks home from school last year, he still hadn’t been able to shake her. Then again, when you live next door to a beautiful girl, its hard to think these things through rationally, anyway. So, since it was Anna he fell for, he’ll be risking the wrath of some terrifying supernatural entity that keeps a backyard in unending twilight, when most kids are watching stupid reality television on Mtv.

School ended, and they made their way home. They stopped in at The Sun Cafe for iced mochas. They’d agreed on this from the beginning, albeit for different reasons. Anna wanted to strategize, Eddie wanted to procrastinate.

Finally, it was time. They made their way to the backyard, staring across the fence at that, thus far, inexplicable darkness. Anna had to admit that she was more frightened than she thought she would be, now that the moment was upon them. Eddie had to admit that he was exactly as frightened as he thought he would be, meaning absolutely and entirely.

“Alright, Eddie. Let’s do this.”

“Sure thing, Anna.”

They walked to the fence, and without any pomp or ceremony, quickly climbed to the opposite side. They’d done it. They were in the shadows. And nothing happened.

They stood there, waiting for the other shoe to drop. Still, nothing. No monsters or alarms, no magic traps or yells from inside the home.

“Hm.” Anna wasn’t sure what she expected to happen when they jumped the fence, but this wasn’t it. She walked to the center of the yard, wondering if the whole adventure would be a bust.

Eddie followed, hoping that Anna would soon grow bored so that they could leave. He was happy nothing had happened so far, but he wasn’t about to assume that meant they were in the clear.

“I guess it’s just the tree casting the shadow, after all. That’s so strange. I was sure there was something more to all of this.”

“Me too. I guess we were wrong. Want to go back and get another mocha?”

“Sure, why not.” Anna kicked a nearby stick in disappointment, just as Eddie was exhaling in relief. They turned to walk back to the fence, and then the fog rolled in. Far more quickly than ever happens in nature, they were quickly surrounded by a thick fog that blinded them from their surroundings. They couldn’t even see each other. They began calling to one another, but the fog did odd things to their voices, making them seem  farther apart than they were, and making it sound as if their voices were coming from the wrong directions.

Fortunately, if there was one thing Eddie had, it was a good sense of direction. He got his bearings, and walked straight to where the fence would be, so he could figure out how to give Anna directions from there. He reached where the fence was and stuck out his hand to grip the cool metal. The only problem was, when he reached out his hand he felt the tree. The tree that he was certain he’d left directly behind him. He put his back to the tree and ran forward, no longer caring which spot along the fence he found himself. With his hands out in front of him, to keep from hitting the fence too hard, he waited for the reassuring feel of ordinary, human-made fencing, in the midst of all this oddness. Yet, what his fingers discovered, yet again, was the tree at the center of the yard.

Now, it was time for desperate measures. There was only one thing left for him to do. Panic. “Anna! What the hell is going on?!?”

the first day of school. [trigger #147]

There is a curious house in Ballard. I won’t tell you exactly what street it is on, because then you might go looking for it, making me partly responsible for whatever trouble you find yourself in. What I will say is that it is ironically close to a place called The Sun Cafe, and I will leave it at that.

Yet, for its proximity to The Sun Cafe, this house is a decidedly unsunny place to be sure. The house itself isn’t particularly special from the outside; just your average, run of the mill old home. It is the backyard that gives a hint as to the truly diabolical nature of the abode. Were I the overdramatic sort, I might accurately call the backyard ‘Lawn of Darkness,’ or, ‘Plot of Shadow.’ I’m not nearly so overdramatic, so we will call this particular spot of turf, ‘The Yard of Perpetual Nighttime.’

You see, this backyard never sees true daylight. On even the brightest of days, which in Seattle are often few and far between, this particular backyard never makes it past the brightness of, say, dusk in November. Normally, it is not the brightest of days, and there is a deeply foreboding shadow that hangs over the area that rests within the fence in the backyard of which I speak.

Most, if they are paying enough attention to notice at all, write this odd darkness off to the massive tree that sits at the center of the yard. Surely, this huge tree, with its thick growth overhead, keeps the sun from ever touching the backyard. Nothing eerie or supernatural about it at all. Most people can quickly convince themselves that this dark backyard isn’t truly remarkable at all. Most people are decidedly stupid.

Anna Booker is not most people. She knows full well that something is off about this house near The Sun Cafe. She knows something fishy is going on. Yet, whereas most people would use this knowledge to steer well clear, it can be pointed out again: Anna Booker is not most people. The fact that she knows the shadows behind this home are far darker than they should be only convinces her more certainly that she absolutely must get back there.

She has thus decided that the afternoon following the first day of school is when she will enter enemy territory. She has also decided that, whether he likes it or not, her best friend Eddie Falcone is coming with her.

welcome back, mr. ashworth. [trigger #146]

Sprinting faster than he ever had before, Jonathan knew that his plan was about to come to fruition. He was going to do it. He never thought he’d pull it off, but it was really going to happen. Tears filled his eyes at the joy of it all. He was actually about to save his wife’s life, 30 years after her death. Theories of time travel had only been a hobby of his, a playful footnote in his glorious career. Yet, when Marilynn had died, he’d jumped headlong into the field and worked tirelessly to construct a time machine for nearly three decades. Now, after all that work and misery, he was about to stop his wife from ever getting into the car that awful Tuesday morning. Two more blocks and he will have done it, travelled through time and altered history. There were risks, to be sure, but he’d suppressed any doubts long ago. All that mattered was saving Marilynn’s life.

He reached their old apartment building and ran into the lobby. Any minute, the elevator door would open, his wife would step out, and he would start the awkward process of trying to explain to her what was going on. At the very least, all he needed to do was delay her long enough that she would avoid the accident. It probably would have been better to devise a plan that didn’t include her knowing he’d travelled in time, but the prospect of seeing her again after all this time proved too strong.

He watched as the numbers above the elevator counted down. Finally, they elevator reached the lobby and the doors began to open. He saw her for the briefest instant through the door, when suddenly bright white light shattered him. It came in through his eyes, even after he’d closed them, and stabbed away at his brain like a million tiny needles. It felt like his body was running away from his mind, like everything was getting farther from him, everything but that hot white light.

As suddenly as it had begun, it stopped. The light vanished, the bizarre physical sensations stopped and were replaced by terrible nausea. He tried to get his bearings. He was in his office again, in the present instead of the past.

His voice was a hoarse whisper as he spoke to himself. “No… what… I’d made it. Why am I back here?”

“Welcome back, Mr. Ashworth.”

Jonathan Ashworth started, when he’d made the jump back in time he was alone in his office, with the door securely locked.

“What… who are you. What’s happening here. My wife, I have to save her. It was going to work.”

“It certainly was going to work, Mr. Ashworth, just as it has all the other times.”

“Other times? What are you going on about?”

“This would have been the 34th time you saved your wife’s life. And while it pains me to say this, we have to cut you off at 33. If we let you keep saving her over and over again, your dimension will never get out of the frightful jam you have it stuck in, and you’ll destroy the universe.”

Jonathan suddenly had a million responses he wanted to make and questions he wanted to ask all at once. What he did instead was lean over the arm of his chair and vomit.

but humans hadn’t existed for centuries. [trigger #145]

It was a remarkably beautiful day, the sort that tends to make everyone’s mood just a tiny bit happier. It was especially beautiful because it was one of those days that happens every few months, when the suns align at opposite points in the sky and give the air that striking purple tint that makes the whole world look more lovely.

Glude was out enjoying the day, wandering through his favorite park. It’s the park right at the end of beta sector, just past the Orion Building. He could spend countless hours there when there isn’t anything else pressing on his time.

Glude needed a day like this. He’d been so weighed down lately. Trying to establish peaceful relations with the Ardent Fringe was going to be a long, difficult, messy situation, if not impossible. That’s why it was particularly stressful for Glude, who was responsible for coordinating all meetings, organizing all peace talks, keeping everyone from getting agitated about details and breaches in protocol so that they could focus on the more serious matter of ending the war.

He was finally starting to relax on his first afternoon off in months when he was startled by movement off to his right in the synthshrubs. He looked more closely, being careful not to move. Just when he was about to give up, thinking the movement had been a figment of his imagination, he saw it again. Something was most definitely moving about just a few meters away.

Against his better judgment, Glude started moving closer. He’d just about halved the distance between himself and where he’d seen the movement when whatever it was in the synthetic bushes bolted and ran to the next clump of growth. Glude started. He could swear he recognized that shape from old holo-films. The movement, the height, the fact that in the brief moment he saw the shape, he noticed that aside from spots on the head and face, most of the body was hairless enough to display flesh the color of high-quality synthetic mahogany. The idea was silly though, Glude reassured himself that he was starting to let stress and an overactive imagination to get the best of him. Everyone knew that humans hadn’t existed for centuries, and there is no way he was seeing one now.

Gandhi and Russell Brand go to dinner. [trigger #144]

“Nonononononono! That’s not how it’s supposed to work. You are supposed to be the good looking one, and I’m supposed to be the smart one. If you start getting smart, everything will be upside down. It’d be like Gandhi and Russell Brand going to dinner, and having Gandhi be funnier. Who’s going to listen to Russell Brand if Gandhi is hilarious and Gandhi. You’re going to edge me out of the business. This isn’t fair.”

integrative project. [trigger #143]

I had to write something for class, it was in narrative form. The assignment was sa follows: Write a 750-1,000 word fictional narrative or play with a metaphor to demonstrate the need for your integration of Text, Soul, & Culture.

I figured, what the hell, count that as a trigger. Two birds with a single stone:

In a way, it was back at the beginning of all things. Before the light and the darkness, before anything at all. Yet, in another way, it was not in the beginning. It was in the space outside of beginnings and time. At once before the beginning, after the beginning, above and below the beginning. This is when the Storyteller walked in the shade of the nothingness. Clearly, there was no true walking, or shade, or even nothingness; yet, this is one of those times when the truth can only be touched by saying things that are merely hints and gestures. Sometimes we get at the truth of the matter best by telling a story, of a story, of a story. This is one of those times.

So it is here, at, but also not at, the beginning, The Storyteller walked in the shade of the nothingness, full of Story, full of Beauty, Art, and Truth. The Storyteller was glad, for she knew that soon she would open her mouth, and through her lips would flow the substance of all things. Not just from her lips, but from her heart, her womb, her lungs, and her mind. Story would leap from her tongue, and within Story, within each line and pause, in each whisper and change of tone, in the cracks between meaning and in the meaning itself, in all of these, being would light into existence.

Like an ember heating until it grows into a flame, it slowly warmed until there was Love and Life and Song and Sex and Evolution and Passion and Peace and Goodness. There was also space for great darkness and absence and pain.

It should be noted that these metaphors are at once apt and alien, because of course, there was no ember, or heat, or flame yet in the universe. Then again, there has always been ember, and heat, and flame, for there has never been a time when the great story was not in the heart of the Storyteller.

And as all things were created in and through the fabric of the great story, The Storyteller thinks to herselves, “With all these stories going around, I should get to making a people from and for my stories. They can hear my stories, and tell my stories, and live my stories, and even help write my stories.”

And so, as she continues to speak the world into being, she also gets to making a people. She whispers them into existence, just as she would a new story.

The people are storytellers, too. They come to hear, and live, and tell, and even write stories. To be storytellers, they are given the ability to write good stories and bad alike, or else they wouldn’t truly be storytellers, but puppets. Thus, some of the stories are happy stories, filled with joy and laughter. Some of the stories are painful, filled with tragedy and darkness. But all stories must be told, even the ones we wish weren’t stories at all.

Some of these people created from and for the stories are captured by Story in a different way than most. It is their heartbeat, their lifeblood, the frame in which they see all things. They are the keepers of the great story. They must always be listening, and watching, and feeling for the story under the story. They must always be telling stories to the world, to remind people of who they are, and who they might become.

These people who are captured by stories in a special way must exist throughout all of human history. They are an interesting and frustrating people. They are tricksters and fools. Many cultures will call them many things, ravens and spiders, demons and angels. Yet, they cannot escape the stories that have captured them, nor the great story underneath all stories. If they try to escape, they do so at their own peril, and it never goes well.

For better or worse, I myself am one of these people. Story is my lot, my task, my burden and my wings. I am a storyteller.

we tried the trick with the onions! [trigger #142]

**ring, ring, ring**

“Hi, you’ve reached Merl Emry. I’m currently indisposed. Please leave a message stating your name and phone number, and, if applicable, the nature of your magical emergency. Thank you.”

“Mr. Emry, we really need your help! I accidently turned my little brother into a pig. My parents are going to be home in less than three hours and we don’t know how to switch my brother back before they get here.

“We’ve tried everything. We tried summoning a faerie to switch him back, but he just laughed at us and made my brother’s snout longer. We tried every correction spell we could find in your books. We even tried the trick with the onions that you said to save for very serious emergencies.

“Please, help us! Or my parents will kill me!”

he rolled his own cigarettes. [trigger #141]

Tony was relentlessly hipster. He personified it, epitomized it. He was hipster incarnate. He got over wearing ironic wolf t-shirts a year before most other hipsters started. He was a thrift store and garage sale master, finding the best clothes and accessories for his hipster lifestyle. He rolled his own cigarettes; only drank cheap, terrible beer; scoffed at anyone who owned a car; and refused to get tattoos from anyone under the age of 50, because they “still remembered when tattoos were becoming an artform.” Tony also stopped listening to a band once 40 people knew who they were, after that things started to get “too commercial.”

Needless to say, Tony was a huge douche-nozzle.