A Work of Fiction

A Work of Fiction

A Work of Fiction



It was a pain in the ass to move all my old stuff into my new apartment, so I decided to knock on my closest neighbor’s doors and ask for help. After I knocked, it was only about a few seconds before the door opened to reveal my new next-door apartment-building neighbor: a nice looking young man in his early twenties- about my age.
I said, “Hello. I’m your new next-door neighbor, Silia Tennis.”
He said to me, “Hey. I’m Gus Field. How you doing?”
I said, “I’m fine. Thank you. How are you doing?”
He said, “I’m alright I suppose.”
“That’s good to hear,” I said.
“Yeah,” he said.
I then went to ask him, “I’m bringing in some of my old materials from my car up to my apartment, and it’s rather difficult work. I’m sorry for asking, but would you be able to help me out?”
He said with a smile, “Sure.”
“Okay,” I said.
He exited his apartment, took out a key from his pocket, locked the door, and said to me, “It’s in the parking garage, right?”
“Yeah,” I said.
We both started heading for the elevator, which was at the end of the hall.
When we got there, Gus looked said to me, “Do you want to press the button, or shall I press it?”
I’m not used to having people ask that, so I said, “You can press it.”
He said, “Sure,” and pressed the button.
The elevator rang up quickly, and the doors opened to reveal inside one of my other neighbors: an older woman, who was carrying groceries.
Gus and I quickly made way for her, and she said, “Thank you” to be both of us.
We both said, “Your welcome”, got in the elevator, and I pressed the level button for the parking garage level, which was down about four levels from us.
In the elevator Gus casually leaned back on the railing and said to me, “That’s Beth Cornell. She’s a nice woman. So, am I the first one of your new neighbors you met?”
I said, “Well, if you don’t count meeting the live-in landlord, you’d be the first for face.”
He said, “This is a nice building not to mention affordable.”
I said, “I got a very good price here.”
He said, “I’ve been living here for two years, and the rates have worked very well for me.”
The elevator had reached the basement and opened just about as he was finishing his sentence.
Gus smiled and said, “Here we are.”
We both left the elevator and entered the parking garage.
He asked me, “Which car is yours?”
I said to him, “I’ll lead you there.”
I walked with Gus over to my gray sedan, took out my keys, and unlocked and opened the trunk to reveal about four larger cardboard boxes of my shit. I was a bit embarrassed.
I said to Gus, “We can each take a box and do two trips.”
He said to me, “That sounds good.”
We each took a box. I put mine on the floor, so I could close the trunk and lock it and put my keys away with hands free. That’s just what I did. I then took my box, and we walked back to the elevator.
He asked me, “Do you want to press the button, or shall I?”
I said, “You can do it.”
Gus pressed the button, and the elevator rang up and opened to reveal itself as empty. We both entered the elevator, and I pressed the button for the third floor as Gus casually leaned back on the railing.
I said to Gus, “I wasn’t able to find any of those wheeled platforms to carry all this stuff.”
He said, “They don’t have those, but that really isn’t a big at all in the long-run.”
I said to him, “What if you are moving out?”
He said, “Okay, two probable instances in your time living here that are both at different ends with the highest possible space in between. That’s still not big in the long-run.”
The elevator opened up to the third floor as Gus was half way through his second sentence. We both walked over to my apartment. I put my box down, took out my keys, opened the apartment door, put keys away, picked up the box, and lead Gus in the door.
My apartment was bare as of now, though it pretty much was furnished and was livable. We were in the living room.
I put my box down a bit up and into the living room from where we were and
instructed Gus, “Just put the box down next to mine”, which he did.
I offered, “Do you want something to eat or drink? I have lemonade and iced tea in the refrigerator.”
He said, “Thank you for offer. I don’t drink ice tea, but I would be delighted to. Do you think that maybe we should do the other load before relax, though?”
I said, “That’s probably a good idea. Let’s go.”
We walked out of my apartment. I closed the door, took out my keys, locked the door, put my keys away, and then we head back towards the elevator.
When we got to the elevator, he once again asked me, “Shall you press the button, or shall I press the button?”
“I’ll press it,” I said, and I pressed it.
The elevator rang up to once again be empty, and we entered it. Gus casually leaned back on the railings and asked me, “What do you do for a living? You out of college?”
I pressed the button for the parking garage level and said, “I’m 23, graduated last year, and have a job as an intern at a firm.”
He asked, “What does this firm do?”
I told him, “I think it’s publishing and advertising.”
He asked, “What do you do as an intern at the firm?”
I told him, “Shit.”
He asked, “When will you stop doing shit?”
I told him, “Maybe a year or two. I’m thinking of quitting.”
The elevator then opened to the garage. We both started walking to my car.
He asked, “What’d you study in college?”
“Business,” I said.
“What do you do?” I asked.
“Oh, I’m writer,” he told me.
We walked to the car. I did my thing and opened it, and we each took out a box. I put mine on the floor, and did my thing and closed. I then picked up the box, and we headed towards the elevator.
I said to him, “What kind of writer do you do?”
“All sorts of freelance,” he said to me, “Screen, television, theatrical, novels, columns. What kind of publishing does your firm do?”
“Magazine mostly,” I told, “And the adds are magazine adds.”
“I wrote for a magazine once and couldn’t stand it,” he said.
I asked, “How old are you?”
We were at the elevator.
He said, “Twenty-four. Now shall you press the button, or shall I press the button?”
I said, “You could do it.”
He pressed the elevator button, and the elevator doors soon opened to reveal a teenage boy in the elevator. He scooted past us and went off into the parking garage. Gus and I entered the elevator.
I asked him. “Are you a successful writer?”
He said, “I think I’m pretty good for what I do. You may see my name, if you search around.”
I asked him, “How does a twenty-four year old get pretty in the writing business?”
He said, “I skipped college and went straight in. I don’t need any pretentious college professors telling me how to use the written word. Also it saved me a lot of money, which I used to help myself out in the business. I write to to write, though. Getting my work sold, made, and published is expression first and money second.”
The elevator had already opened on the third floor, and we were already walking to my apartment. When we got there, I put my box, did my thing to open the door, motioned for Gus to go in, and then followed him. We both put our boxes down, next to the other ones, and I closed the door.
I then said to Gus, “What you do with writings sounds very nice and fulfilling?”
He responded, “You could say that. You could call me a dreamer.”
I then said to Gus, clasping my hands, “Yeah. Now, how about that lemonade? You can sit down on the love seat.”
He responded, “Thank you,” and sat on the love seat.
I went into the kitchen to get lemonade.
As I was in the kitchen getting out glasses, getting the pitcher from the refrigerator, and pouring the lemonade into the glass I asked Gus over in the living room, “Why don’t you drink ice tea?”
Gus said to me over in the kitchen, “That’s a story. I’ll it to you, when we’re drinking lemonade.”
“Okay,” I said.
I finished with the lemonade and put the pitcher back, bought in the glasses, gave a glass to Gus. I sat on the chair diagonal from it. The coffee table was in between us.
“So tell me,” I said, “Why don’t you drink ice tea?”
He said, “Well, that’s because I made a bet. It was, when I was about fourteen. I was with three friends of mine, and we were having a five-dollar poker game. I lost miserably in a few hands, but really did not want to give up my five dollars. I sat there until the game ended, and the winner said that he would not take my five dollars, if I could make a true sacrifice for him. I thought a sacrifice would be an interesting and worthwhile thing to do, which I still believe. I told him that I would give up anything contained caffeine. So, chocolate, tea, coffee, soda, speed, gone. And I don’t even like to consume the decaffeinated versions of them for the possibility of trace amounts of caffeine.”
“I see,” I said, “So, can you tell me more about being a writer?”
“Sure,” he said, “I write my works, basically on my own time. I am free to do my thing, and, when a work is finished, I’ll submit it to my agent, who I rarely see in person, and he’ll try to, many times unsuccessfully, sell it for a reasonable price, and even when it is bought, that doesn’t mean that it will get made or published. That’s a dream job for a writer believe it or not.”
“What have you written that’s gotten made or published?” I asked,
“Two novels. Neither are bestsellers, but I did make a profit on them from royalties. I used to be a columnist for a shit magazine that does shit business, so maybe there are about one to two dozen articles/columns, including other stuff I have done outside the magazine. A screenplay of mine got turned into a low-radar low box office indie film, but it got reviewed well by some respectable critics. Another screenplay was turned into a porn film, not my original intention, though I have nothing against the industry, and another screenplay was re-written by another writer almost to the point of being a near separate work, and it got turned into a really bad indie film. I also do television episodes for anthology shows. That’s probably my largest steady income. My biggest success was a trilogy of plays I wrote that had a very nice run in a scattering of lesser theaters.”
“All this, and your so young,” I said.
“I have whole career ahead of me,” Gus said.
He then drank about half his glass of lemonade, and I did the same thing with mine.
I was fascinated by Gus.
“So, Gus, what would you say right now about the condition of the art form of writing in America?” I inquired.
Gus responded, “It’s fine. I have nothing against it. There is heavy commericialism out there in writing but no more than anything in pretty much every other item that’s available to the masses. I wish it was all and always about the art, but that’s not going to happen, and that doesn’t need to happen. I do what I love.”
“Can you tell me what those two novels you wrote are about?” I asked.
He said, “Sure. The first one that got published is called, “The Butterfly,” and it’s about Alfon Terrimo, a mid thirties fellow, who recently got divorced to his wife of six years, and the four months after the divorce that he spends on a prostitute binge. I didn’t like it that much. The story didn’t really interest me. It was something I had written earlier just to write from an idea that popped into my head, but my agent liked it, and the second publisher he bought it to agreed and paid me a moderate sum for it. The second one I wrote was called “Light Life” and was about a gang member, who is hired to snipe people from a rooftop at random by a developer in order to scare away people to make room for a development. I have affection for that one and pulled no punches in trying to make it politically correct or morally acceptable. I don’t need to tell you that that’s fiction and not real life.”
“Of course,” I said, “But I understand you saying that.”
“I know,” he said, “Some people just can’t accept fantasy.”
“It’s a shame. They don’t know what they are missing,” I said.
“It’s a shame,” he said, “But it helps sell, when there is a controversy.”
“I don’t doubt that,” I said, “So tell me about your screenplays?”
“They aren’t much. All three are comedic to semi-comedic crime stories about hitmen in various situations involving fanciful elements,” he told me.
“What was trilogy of plays about?” I asked.
“Three stages of an individual’s life. Her 17-29. Her 30-36, and her 37-40, in which she decides to take her own life. It fascinated people, and they had to buy three tickets for one story,” he said.
“Speaking of tickets, do you like to go out to the movies?” I said.
“Being that I’ve written for the cinema I somewhat enjoy going to the cinema. I still prefer to just sit and watch a DVD at home, though,” he said.
“Yeah,” I responded.
“Let me ask you a question,” he said, “How do you feel about food?”
“Food you say?” I said.
“Yes,” he said, “The wonder of food. It has been said that a great meal is a wonderful pleasure. Would you find it a wonderful pleasure?”
“I would, but there are so many other pleasures like experiencing a good fiction or sex,” I said.
“Sex is great,” he said.
“It’s a gift from God,” I said.
“God has given us many gifts. What do you think is the nature of sex?” he said.
“I think that sex is two natures. One is pleasure, and one is the creation of life. Both are very important and near and dear to my heart,” I said.
“Indeed,” he said, “You know, I once went to a club in New York, and there was a man there, and he was selling alcohol. I asked him what he thought about the job, and he said it was a job like any other.”
“What was that have to do with what we were talking about?” I asked.
“I dunno,” he said, “I thought that was an interesting thing that I wanted to share.”
He finished up the lemonade and said, “Thanks. I’m good for now,”
“Okay,” I said, “On a scale of anything above zero to ten how would you rate this apartment building? ”
“An 8.3,” he said, “It’s nice and affordable but doesn’t have anything make it so much better than an 8.3. You just got here, but from your impression, how would you rate it?”
“I’d give it a 7.6,” I said, “Same reasons as you except that I don’t think that I don’t think it has anything to make it so much better than an 7.6.”
I finished my lemonade.
Gus then said, “I love the number-point-decimal system of grading. It’s so precise and nice to look at. It’s like those 0-100 grades in school. It gets it right. It achieves a precise and superb evaluation representation. I’d give the number-point-decimal system of grading a 9.6. ”
“You know, I’m going to have to disagree with you on that. It may be specific, but that’s not exactly a good thing. It is so specific that it becomes incredibly subjective and not very much helpful to others looking for a recommendation. If you have a less specific grade like letter grades or just 1-10 with only halves, you may get a much easier idea,” I gave.
“I disagree. The decimal system does give you an idea, but it also allows for you to know for sure how the grader felt. Also some people may like the precision. Some people see the decimals as a ballpark as I am sure you felt, when you gave a 7.6 and not a 7.5 or 8,” he responded.
“I was being specific, but I’m just saying that maybe people would be better off with more of a ballpark idea than a specification,” I said.
“Okay. You know, why didn’t just tell me to not have precise decimals?” he said.
“It doesn’t matter,” I said, “Let’s change the subject, but you know, I enjoyed that mini-debate.”
“I enjoyed it too,” Gus said, “Why don’t we have another? What’s the ideal afterlife?”
“That’s too personal to debate, but I’m going to say anyway. I go to heaven or hell for a period of time based on how I was in this life and then my soul gets stripped clean and put back in another body and that repeats until eventually whatever is truly best for me comes to happen,” I said.
“Believe it or not mine is pretty similar,” he said, “Only in mine everyone goes to heaven.”
“I can understand that,” I said, “So, where did you go to high school?”
“In upstate New York,” he said, “It was a shitty little place with nice students and shitty teachers and shitty classes and shitty programs and shitty cafeteria and shitty administration and okay rules and regulations.”
“That doesn’t sound too good,” I said, “But I went to a nice big place with very nice students and wonderful teachers and classes and programs and cafeteria and administration and extremely good rules and regulations. They let you say “fuck”, and people didn’t abuse it.”
“You’re quite luck,” he said, “I wish the quality of my school was better. Maybe that was something that helped turn me away from college. My teachers were assholes, and I knew the professors would only be worse”
“College is overrated like you already figured out,” I said, “But you know what’s something I noticed. There is this idea that high school is about all those ridiculous and specific cliques and all those bullshit social things.”
“Were they cliques that were precise to the individuals or just specific in the nature of their design?” he said.
“That doesn’t matter much in the grand scheme, though I’d have to say that they were mostly just specific in this idea,” I said, “But anyway what matters is that I never experienced something like that in my highs school days to that degree. Sure, there was social pressure and all that other stuff, but there were no cliques so specific and almost religious-like, and there was not really so incredibly much social bullshit. I think that that idea is largely an invention of the media and fiction,”
“Of course it is,” he said. “Do you really think high school is like that? It’s a literary cliché. Though, I don’t think we should be absolute. We only have our experiences to speak for.”
“I suppose,” I said.
“Don’t you love America?” he said.
“I suppose I love America,” I said, “Why?”
“Because in America I can say “Fuck the USA!” with pride and will only be acting in the spirit of the country’s creation. Because of the first amendment.”
“Free speech,” I said.
“Has there ever been a greater phrase,” he said, “Has there ever been a greater dream for a writer such as I?”
“I can’t really much of any,” I said, “Though, you still gotta deal with obscenity laws.”
“Fascist horrors they are. It’s speech, if it does not violate another persons or property,” he said.
“I agree,” I said.
“All of these censors can fuck themselves,” he said, “But I would never take away their right to express their view. Just to realize it.”
“And therein lay the beauty of America,” I said.
“Indeed,” he said. “What do you think of talk radio?”
“I don’t listen to it,” I said.
“I’ve listened to it,” he said, “And to hear all of this ridiculous fascist censorship speech it makes me think “hypocrisy” because they could just as well be censored for their bullshit, if we had censorship.”
“Yeah,” I said.
“What do you think of the local evening news,” he asked.
“What channel?” I asked.
“The evening news in general,” he said.
“5 or 10?” I asked.
“Both,” he said.
“There’s news in there, but there is also a lot of fluff,” I said, “I wish instead of fluff they could interview people for their political opinion like on the news channels.”
“I like the fluff,” he said, “In addition to the real news. What do they need opinion for? Fluff is interesting.”
“I disagree. I don’t want to see fluff stuff on the news. It’s unimportant and wholly uninteresting to me. I want to see real shit,” I said.
“I see, but don’t you think that maybe opinion isn’t suited to the evening news. Opinion sort of aligns itself with ideology and ideology can accused of leaking into the objective news.”
“If you show both sides, you don’t get ideology, and who says that you don’t get ideology anyway? I see their tone, when they report the edgier topics,” I said.
“Okay,” he said, “I’ll give you that, but I still like my fluff.”
“And I still would like my opinions on the evening news,” I said.
“Very well,” said Gus.
I, “Do you want to have sex right now?”
Gus, “That sounds lovely.”
Gus started taking off his clothing right then and there, and I started taking off mine too.
Gus, “Do you want to do it here?”
I, “Don’t get any semen on the floor?”
Gus, “I’m not sloppy.”
I, “I think I know. I’m just making sure.”
Gus, “Okay.
When were both naked, Gus took a good look at my naked body.
Gus, “You’ve got a fine body.”
I took a good look at Gus’s.
I, “Yours is also fine.”
Gus, “Now, of course we are going to use protection.
I, “Of course.
Gus went to his pants and took out his wallet, which has a condom in it.
Gus, “I always keep a spare. Now, do you want to get me erect, or shall I arouse myself?”
I, “For safety, it wouldn’t be physical contact, right?”
Gus, “Of course.”
I, “Shall I pose?”
Gus, “Lay down on the love seat, and I’ll think good thoughts.”
I smiled and laid down on the love seat. I put my hands right next to my vagina on either side to flaunt it. Gus seemed to be thinking but not thinking a lot. I saw his penis shoot up, and Gus quickly put the condom on it.
Gus, “Now, what shall we do with my penis?”
I, “Why don’t I suck on it?”
Gus, “Are you okay with the taste of condom?”
I, “Sure. I like to feel the semen through it anyway.”
Gus, “Okay.”
I got off the couch and got on my knees in front of Gus, who was standing up with his penis out there covered by white.
I, “Is the condom flavored?”
Gus, “No.”
I, “Shall I move with my mouth, or shall you move your penis?”
Gus, “Why don’t you move with your mouth?”
I, “Wouldn’t my teeth bother you?”
Gus, “Don’t worry.”
I put my mouth over his penis and started moving my head back and forth, massaging his penis. I could see him being pleasured, and I felt warm inside. Soon the semen came, and I could feel its warmth through the condom. This may be the best oral sex I’ve ever had with a condom. I still kept my mouth on it and my head going back and forth a little after he came. When I took my head off his penis, I looked up at him, and he looked back at me. His penis shrunk, and he held the condom on,
I, “That was really nice.”
Gus, “Yes, it was. I am inspired to continue work on my novel. This was a pleasure. I haven’t had sex in a long time believe it or not.”
I, “Neither have I.”
Gus said, “Can I use your shower and garbage?”
I said, “Of course.”
Gus said, “I think I know, where the bathroom is.”
Gus walked over to the bathroom with the condom held onto his penis. I hope he doesn’t get semen everywhere, but I don’t take him for that type. He said himself that he wasn’t sloppy. I think I’m going to lay on the love seat.
I put my clothes on and then got on the love seat. I just sat there and thought about really nice stuff. Gus would be a great friend.