Block by Block

                                                                                    It has been said that the Never Ending Story is perhaps the greatest film of all time on nearly every single film list of all time. No one can explain why. It has also been said that writing is hard, this of course is not true either, this is a lie writers perpetuate to make their work seem hard and to scare meddling young potential writers away. In truth writing is no harder than preparing a sandwich. I think my story will show this. When writing something a writer must always keep in mind their target audience, a writer must fear their audience and use whatever rhetoric to manipulate the reader, and, under no circumstances, must the writer enjoy their work. Now you may think that I am employing irony already in this text, of course you are mistaken, for you see I just brought to your attention that I may have been, which proves I wasn’t. The reason this is a short story is plain and simple, I am not being paid. You may think this is mad! You may say ‘Why devote time to something you don’t make a living from?’ My answer is I am hoping to sell it afterward and then get paid. They say Harry Potter and the Sinister Frog is the greatest film of all time, and like every film that has and will ever exist, it has a love story, a battle between the forces of good and the forces of evil, and a protagonist. You see I am a film buff that is why I’ve gotten into writing. When I heard they made a book out of the Harry Potter franchise I decided to adapt one of my films. It has it all. Anyway, I am not going to read back over this, I have to go to town, so you know, it’s not that I am stupid. I’ll now hand you over to the Narrator.

       

                  Yes, well… thank you. Me think what I am trying to explain above is… ok… wait… yes I am gone. Don’t listen to what I was saying up there me know I am too much of an imbecile to read over any of this so me will be honest. You are now in the capable hands of me, me is the most trustworthy narrator. Me have travelled to hundreds, if not thousands of other stories trying to improve my acting career. Sometimes, me may adopt the voice of a wise old black soul, sometimes me may adopt a cold hearted describer of a hopeless dystopia; it pays good money. Anyway me is adopting the role today of… well… I don’t want to give it away, but us words may just be sent here to confuse you. 



- Well your argument is futile Brian; one cannot express an alternative to egotism with such egotistical ideas.

- Ah but you see that is where you are wrong!

- Excuse me, are you ready to order or will I come back in 5 minutes?

- Humanity is ultimately doomed should it progress this way, unless more people realise what I now know.

- Well it is true that people inherently cannot think for themselves and have to be distracted in many ways, I’m thinking of writing a book on that actually. I’ve read over one hundred books on it you know.

- One hundred, I’m impressed, I’ve actually found a very good one myself, you’ve probably never heard of it, it’s quite rare. I think it’s the one hundred and thirty sixth I’ve read on the matter, I believe it’s called ‘Humans, in Three Categories’.

- Ah yes I’ve read that, it’s most interesting. I think I’ve read it three times; I like to do that with each book, to… deconstruct them.

- Sorry… no… it’s ‘Humans, in Four Categories’.

- Ah… yes, uh well you should… try to get your hands on ‘Humans, in Three Categories’ too, it’s… very concise.

- Excuse me, but, are you ready to order or shall I come back?

- I’m sorry Ms, but can’t you see me and my friend are having a very important conversation? However, if you must be so rude, I shall have the Vomissements de la mousse with a sprinkle of pressé de navet , Brian?

- Yes, I’ll have the same but can I have an Oeuf de la Albatross cracked into mine?

- Eh… sure! Let me just check that now sir, I’m sure it’s no problem.

- Brian?

- Yes… What is it Brian?

- Hang on… did you see her? Making that face at me, people really do annoy me sometimes, I mean we sit here talking about real things, and she just wants to go out drinking, people really are stupid.

- They are. That actually reminds me of something I saw in a marvellous Japanese animation, it had all these underlying messages that are really honest and true, it’s a shame more people can’t decipher them, Westerners really have a lot to learn.

- Yes I wish I was born in another culture, I actually found one on the internet that doesn’t embrace all the commercialist ways of these filth among us, I found it on this app I downloaded, look. 

- That actually reminds me of a funny caricature I spotted in the paper, it had this()

- That actually reminds me of this real life stills piece I’m working on with()

- That actually reminds me; By the Bog of Cats is on Wednesday it offers a great insight into()

- That actually reminds me a wing nut screw was discovered there recently that dates to()

- That actually reminds me of the great poem()



The two speakers carried on in this way for, oh, twenty movements of the café clock’s minute hand, when suddenly something rather gruesome happened. Someone emerged from the jittery beaded entrance, someone rather average, with rather bad posture, and rather angry.



- Em… he hesitated.

- Brian and Brian? He said in a gravelly and knowing way. Knowing, in the way a villain might greet two spies that broke into his underground fortress, killed hundreds of guards and laid waste to countless valuable resources, only to wind up in an elaborate trap.

- Who are you?

- Yes, explain yourself!



Now it must be said, prior to this point, Brian and Brian had not noticed the contents of the man’s hands; an AK-47. Oh yes, sorry, I forgot to mention that. The mysterious man, holding an AK-47, proceeded to unleash a tail of bullets into the heads, necks, and guts of the Brians, producing a gentle patter sound of blood on the neighbouring tables. The fury continued for some twenty seconds until the valve spring finally stopped shaking.



- This actually reminds of... 



Again the stranger emptied a clip, this time stepping forward as he fired. The spray of blood increased in size and lessened in individual drop thickness with each step; I’ve done up a rather impressive chart on the figures, if only you could see it. Interesting was the sheer area covered by the men’s liquid, I say liquid because the stomachs and bladders of the Brians almost simultaneously exploded mixing together in the air and covering themselves and everybody else in the room. The bullets then stopped.



- What are you doing you idiot? Brian spat aloud.

- Yes, why did you pelt us?

- You’re not dead?



The armed gentleman then continued to fire blankly into the bodies of the Brians for a further twenty minutes. He kept firing as the men kept squirming and flailing their arms. Then, having exhausted his supply of ammunition, he dropped the gun and broke into tears. The man, now infamous in the hearts of the customers of that store, looked at a crimson cup, resting on the table and despaired to himself.



- Why are you two always haunting me?

- This actually reminds me of a Stewart Lee show, I believe he was the first to bring to light this satire.

- Shut up! Just shut up! Why don’t you fucking die?

- Actually I’m sure even someone like you knew we wouldn’t.   

         

                      Rory Brown sat in a little café in Dublin. He’d been sitting there for hours with pen in hand and paper not in hand but on table, nothing was written on it. He’d been considering for the last twenty minutes whether or not to go ahead and be clichéd (in his own words), be self-indulgent (again in his own words), and write his story about a writer named Charlie. His head itched from sweating and his bottom ached with writer’s cramp, ‘It has to be something… new’ he thought, ‘Why do all my ideas sound so self-important? Why can’t I…’

Brilliance, and I mean remarkable brilliance, struck him almost immediately after these musings. He banished all thoughts of Charlie when suddenly...

Donald walked into a little café in Dublin; he’d smelled better places, but needed somewhere quiet, and this little tea brown hovel was just the place. Donald, after making his order and flirting a bit with the waitress, sat down in a snug looking corner so he could view the entire plain. There were only five other tables and four other customers: calm yet loud scarf-wearing gentlemen at one table, the back head of one extremely frustrated looking man, and a writer, which was interesting because Donald too was a writer.



- Ahhh! Rory yelled. Damn it, what is wrong with me?



                    Rory had been so absorbed in his own work that he hadn’t taken the usual measures people take to appear sane in the world. He looked around and saw the curled up noses of two snotty looking gentlemen, a mysterious looking man in the corner, and a writer, which Rory found interesting because he too was a writer. An air of shame enveloped Rory and so he hid, using the top of his head as a replacement for the embarrassment taking refuge on his face. He could not keep it down for long though as a bang came from the entrance of the café and his surprise forced a jolt of his neck toward the sound. Standing at the beads was a slightly overweight, boringly normal looking man, holding what appeared to be a gun. Rory thought at first fear would grip him, but there was no fear. There was a strange feeling in him, it was a feeling of confusion, because what he was really feeling was elation, rendering the confused feeling quite confusing indeed. Hope crept up on Rory as he, unable to stop himself, leapt to his feet and started in to a fit of cheering.



- Yes, go on man do it! Do it! You can end it this time!



The man at the door turned slowly like a villain might, not a main villain now, but one who is perhaps the main villain’s right hand man and provides the brawn to the main villain’s brains, who dies perhaps four sixths of the way through the film at the hand of a secondary hero, after a large fight which he initially seems to be winning but then ultimately dies. That is the way he turned.



- Woah, Rory exclaimed, what are you doing?

- I’m killing you.

- What? Wh-why? You’re supposed to kill those guys, those two stuck up arseholes.

- Why?

- Well because that’s the way it’s written ‘The mysterious man, holding an AK-47, proceeded to unleash a tail of bullets in to the heads, necks, and guts of the Brians’

- Why would someone write that?

- They’re snobs, they’re the arseholes, and they’re the ones who think they’re some sort of superior species observing us all. They’re the idiots.

- Are they the idiots Rory? Because you know what?  I think you only hate these people because you are afraid that they are manifestations of your own insecurities. You hate these ‘pretentious people’ only because you hate yourself, and everyone’s sick of it. You’re only going to alienate everyone that way.

- What?

- Look, did you ever question why you wanted to be a writer? It’s obvious. You just want to show everyone who you really are, but somewhere along the line you got caught up in showing everyone how smart you are. You don’t need complex narrative structures to be a good writer, just be honest and show your substance. You are more than say, a director who does a film and says in the interviews ‘This is essentially a struggle between good and evil’ and you know it!

- Wow, you are not the character I was expecting you to be at all.

- Stop it.

- Ok then, say what you’re saying is true; do you want me to just go back to writing ‘I feel sad today, I don’t like feeling sad; it makes me sad’ because you know what?  That’s more self-satisfying, and you know what else? You wouldn’t exist either, none of this would exist. This is more than a struggle between good and evil yes, I just want to show the complexity of the substance in the style, who cares if it maybe a bit bloated and pretentious, maybe that’s a good thing.

- Listen to yourself. Anyway you know I’m not talking to you Rory, if we agreed on this sort of stuff it wouldn’t make any sense to put it on paper! Do you know what I mean?

- Yeah… I think I do.



                        ‘Damn ink’ thought Rory, ‘I was just getting something good there’. Rory stood up and rubbed his backside furiously, and I do mean furiously, sitting on that chair for hours was leaving him with the rectum of a tortoise, which the Wikipedia page doesn’t seem to have any information on but I imagine it’s quite rough. He’d soon softened it back to its squidgy state only to find, at a turn, a middle-aged woman with a retractingly wicked face and, her grandson with a half-gawking, half-bored mug staring back at him through the café window.



- Dear lord. Michael, don’t look at them… homosexuals, in their homosexual cafés. It’s the middle of the day, she now directed her voice at Rory; have you no shame at all?

    Rory blushed again but would realise later that this is exactly the sort of comic relief a story could use. ‘I’ve got to remember this now. Alright, where am I?’

- I’ve got the two Brians, the Rory guy, the waitress, the Charlie and Donald guys, the guy standing at the entrance, the narrator, he muttered to himself under his breath as he made to go out a buy a pen. How do I get him outside the café?

- Excuse me sir?

- How do I get him outside this uninspired muck-hole? He continued whispering as he walked.

- Sir?

- Oh I think I got it. Wait muck-hole? Holes are generally mucky anyway, ah sure I’ll think of something better later.

Just then the waitress grabbed him.

- Sir you haven’t paid your bill!

- Damn it, it’s gone now thank you! Can’t you see I’m thinking of something important here?

  He looked at her and saw the face she’d made earlier, with the two Brians and he instantly shook.

- No, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean that, here’s the money and here have a tip, sixty per-cent?

- Are you ok?

- I’m not Brian… or Brian, and I’m not Donald, or even Charlie, or Rory, I mean I am Rory but I’m not JUST Rory, I’m Rory. Look I’m not like the other guys in here.

- Ehm… I have a boyfriend.

- What? Eh no that’s not…



Before Rory could think of something to say the waitress had made an even more peculiar face, a face filled with pity and fear, this face was much worse than the one she’d used before, she walked away with a nervous step, though didn’t dare look back.

‘Shit, that was stupid’ Rory left now to evade the awkward avoided glances of a twenty year old student/waitress, as well as to search for a pen.



- I must find this pen, he said rather brownly as he accidently (I mean obviously accidently) stood on dog poo, which was now mushed into the street. ‘Ah for god sake, I wish I was squished under that ellipsoid sun in the sky like this poo’

- If I don’t find this pen quick I think this whole story will turn to shit.

Immediately following twenty shoe scrapes on the curb, Rory made off in a sloppy walk, his legs softened, and his muscles clenched.

- Oh shit, Rory bellowed as he picked up the pace, I feel like crap.

He eventually arrived at Eason's on Abbey Street and plopped down in front of the stationary, feeling himself quickly turning into a mere stain, he excreted to the nearest person.

- Help me!

The man who answered his call had an unusually short throat and wore a turtle neck jumper, which Rory saw as amusing, though he knew his readers would not so he thought ‘No, I couldn’t use that for my story’

- The names Russell Johns sir, how may I help?

- Do you work here or something?

- Whatever do you mean?

- Well I might be talking shite, but it’s just from your disposition…

- Potty talk, now what would you like sir, there is a fine selection to choose from, Eason's only stocks the best!

- I’m working on a story actually… it’s kind of…

- Now, what can I get for you?

- I’m looking for a pen.

- Oh, a pen man is it? Well we’ve got plenty of those, pens that is, not pen men.

- Hang on you said ‘we’ there, I thought you didn’t work here!

- Oh… eh… I don’t, I meant it like you would a football team, you know goooooo Eason’s!

- Hmmm, I don’t know.

- Look, I don’t work here alright! I don’t, never have, and never will! So drop it, it would be in your best interest if you did, I don’t work for Eason’s now here’s your pen, I’ve had enough of you toilet humour crap, now get out! And please come again and enjoy all our wonderful books, go Eason’s!



  After Rory got the pen he felt a sudden change, the heavens opened up and he didn’t think the story would be that shit after all. He raced back toward the café now with inspiration in his heart, and clear bowels. He didn’t even stop to observe the beautiful sights that might have been there, but then again might not have been because he didn’t see them and could never have described their magnificent soul altering appearance; the natural wonders such as the golden rose tree which gleamed the spectacular setting sun off of its rare butter coloured flora branches, onto the pale but pink tinted cheeks of Rory’s true love, whom would nourish his heart till his end of days and into the next existence. However, Rory did not see these things and so could never have described them. He probably would have made up some other images to fill in the gap of his time running; oh yes the running. Hang on let me read up for a second or twenty, oh yes. Rory was in the grip of a sudden change; he knew, with his new pen, he could think of something.



- Ok: two Brians, man with gun, waitress, Charlie, Donald, Rory, Narrator, Lady, Michael, turtle neck guy; he sprinted feeling an icy and refreshing wind rush into his throat.

- Eh… Arguing, shooting, outside Rory, circular, block, internal argument, pen, homosexual, awkward part, shit part, shit/Monty Python rip off part, the describing things, the recap thing, his mind now erratic and oblivious to the world around him.

- Come on! Man with gun homosexual, Charlie and Donald rip off was it? Wait shit was it? Oh yes the café!

Rory now pumped up with adrenaline stormed through the beads and, feeling over charged with energy, stopped, slowly turned his head around about twenty degrees. He noticed someone, a writer (which he thought was interesting because he was a writer too), sitting where he sat not twenty minutes earlier. He tried to remember his story, but found it fleeting from his memory, he tried to remember himself but he couldn’t.

- Em… he hummed into the café, but no words followed.



He panicked as he felt his head itch with sweat. ‘What the hell am I doing?’ he quivered in his head as he saw the fear of the young woman behind the counter. ‘Ok what is going on? Hmmm I came into this café… and then… wait… no… or… yes… I know, I was writing, I’m a writer!’ The sweat eased a bit, ‘Yes, I’m a writer… and ehhh… I was… hmmm. Ok so I’m a writer and I’m coming into a café, maybe the café has something to do with the story… eh… no that’s not it. Maybe me standing here is the start of the story, though, it does seem like I was in here already. Hmmm why can’t I remember anything? Alright, so I’m a writer and… no it’s blank, I’ve got no more ideas’. He looked down, and, as though by a familiar surprise, a gun was in his hands.  ‘I’m a writer and I can’t think of anything else, fine’



- Brian and Brian? Passed through Rory’s lips without consciousness.

- Who are you?

- Yes, explain yourself!

‘Fine’

- You are going to die.