The Main Character - A Story by Jon & Josh

1

Steam rises in thin tendrils from the still-hot pavement, freshly cooled by an evening rain. The main character walks quickly down an empty street, glancing over their back every so often. They pull their hood from the old grey hoodie over their head and continue on, hands buried in the front pocket of the worn garment. The street is lined by skyscrapers, rising from a garden of trash and debris like cold lithic trees, long forgotten by the gardener.

Randomly, the character takes a left down an alley. They cannot shake the feeling that they are being followed. The shadows begin to stretch as the sun loses its circadian battle with the horizon. Our character weaves on through the cityscape, unaware of the impending change that approximates them. As the first writer begins to finish his contribution, he cannot help but pause and wonder what his companion might have in store for the main character.

The character rounds a corner and pauses, peering ahead into the gloom. A figure approaches them, stepping slowly through the shallow puddles of water that line the alleyway. Finally, the shadow’s face comes into view and the main character recoils with a sharp gasp. The second writer is here.

2

He wastes no time with introductions. “I’ve been waiting for you,” he snarls. “…for about a week now.” The second writer’s face is hard and severe—like that of a gay woman. The left side of his face twitches a couple of times, and after a moment more of steely-eyed staring, he takes the main character by the hand and leads them deeper into the alley. The main character, dubious but obedient, goes along.

Cat-sized rats scamper out of their way as they wind, apparently aimless, through the bowels of the city, far from the great dark blue above and into the black and grey. The more they descend, the more everything changes. Street-sounds fade and give way to hissing vents, shouting tenants, and slamming doors. Side-walk joggers and night-time shoppers are replaced with urine peddlers and porn hustlers. Expertly, the second writer dodges them each time they appear. “Get out of the way, you grungy bitches,” he says to them as they pass.

The main character, now a little impressed despite his initial misgivings, finds themself taking a strange kind of comfort in the ease with which the second writer navigates the alleys, while also managing to rattle off the words of the story, which now seems to be taking on a life of its own.

In fact, they are thinking what a good job the second writer is doing when suddenly, a decommissioned cab car screeches to halt in front of them, stopping the two in their tracks. The main character is startled once more, but the second writer is ready. Swiftly and deftly, he opens the passenger door of the car and beckons the main character forward. “Get in,” he says. “It’s the first writer’s turn again.”

3

Without much thought at this point, the main character mechanically steps forward and stooping, drops themself onto the fraying grey leather backseat. A thought crosses their mind of whether free will is a myth as they feel themselves being pulled aimlessly through the narrative, but the thought quickly flees, leaving them feeling numb and disenchanted. The second writer plops down onto the seat beside them and to the protest of the rusted and squeaky door hinge, shuts the door with a slam.

“Where are we going now?” the main character lamely asks. The second writer gestures vaguely into space but remains silent, staring straight ahead. The first writer, realizing that at this point there can be no dialogue from the second writer, and furthermore, realizing that to speak for someone else would be considered rude, begrudgingly realigns his mind with the plot in hopes of furthering the story in some meaningful matter.

An avatar, greasy in appearance, with a torn tan trench coat and a vintage tweed newspaper-boy cap half-turns from the drivers’ seat. The stub of a chewed-on cigar hangs loosely, framed between ruddy jowls and mottled beet-red lips. The main character can hardly take their gaze off of the too-short stogie, dancing delicately on the precipice, as the first writer assumes this new and interesting character as a persona for the time being.

“Right, strap in you hear,” he mumbles with an apparently British accent. He turns with a grunt and jams the shifter knob on the steering column into drive. The car lurches forward reluctantly, straining against the laws of physics as it picks up speed. The main character watches from their window, bewildered, as the water droplets on the glass trek horizontally toward the back of the car.

Soon the cityscape disappears, replaced with broad, dark and menacing fields, filled with the local crop. “See that up ahead,” the first writer narrates, “that’s our destination.”

“What is that place,” the main character mumbles?

“Dunno, ask ‘im.”

4

“We’re here to harvest piglets,” the second writer says, thinking that anyone should know a pig farm when they see one. The first writer, rendered mute in the front seat, squints his eyes in the rear-view mirror. He hopes for a knowing look at the second writer but the second writer’s eyes are on the horizon. Disappointed, he slumps in his worn leather seat.

The main character speaks next. “Harvest piglets?” they say. “Did you say ‘harvest piglets?”

The second writer doesn’t reply except to sigh very loudly. He doesn’t even look at the main character; his thousand-yard stare is pointed at a pair of iron silos off in the distance, behind which the country sun is preparing to rise. He takes in a slow breath, opens the cab door, and steps out. He walks a few paces away and stands in the gravelly shoulder of the road. In a moment, he puts his hands on his hips and turns around. “Well! Come on, then!” he says to the main character, whose face is the picture of disbelief.

“What—! Wh—” they stammer. They look at the first writer, who shrugs as if to say “Beats me, dude.”

Incredulous, the main character gets out of the cab car. They are in a daze. When they join the second writer on the shoulder, the second writer gives a wave to the first writer, who puts the car in gear and peels away, leaving a cloud of amber dust in his wake.

The main character takes up their line of questioning once more. “Mr. Sir. Did you say that we are here to harvest—”

“Oh my Jesus fucking Christ!” the second writer explodes. “Yes! That’s what I said!” He seizes the main character by the lapels of his pinche pastel polo shirt and gives him a shake. “It was the first goddam thing to come into my fucking brain when I sat down to write this! Why do you have to keep bringing it up!? Fuck!”

Huffing, the second writer lets go of the main character and smooths out the wrinkles he’s made on the main character’s shirt. “I’m sorry about that,” he says. His face is red with angry embarrassment. “I’m already near the end of my turn, word-wise, and all I’ve done is muck about.”

Sighing, the second writer turns away to look once more at the silos in the field.

Several silent minutes pass, when suddenly, the main character takes off for the middle of the field, all on their own.

“What are you doing?” the second writer calls, throwing his hands up.

The main character shouts his answer without slowing down or turning back. “To make the best of it!”

5

The main character turns from their reply, still running at full speed, and slams into the barrel chest of a mustachioed towering man. They bounce back several feet and land on the soft dirt, dazed and shaken.

“I think that he meant ‘Where are you going,’” the giant of a man spoke, his voice deep, monotone, and gravely, not unlike a certain woodworking, bacon-eating, beloved fictional parks department employee.

“What” the main character asked?

“He asked you what you are doing and you replied to make the best of it. So, either you or he misspoke.” The towering man—clearly implied to be the newest avatar of the first writer—proffers a gloved hand to the main character. They are pulled up hastily and stand in the afternoon sun glancing around. The second writer has vanished. “Probably embarrassed by that dialogue gaffe,” the first writer knowingly mumbles through his mustache, the slightest smirk playing at the edge of his lips. “Follow me, son.”

The main character glumly falls in line, replaying what he said over and over as he and the first writer cross the dusty field, heading toward the metal silos. He is pulled from his reverie by the high-pitched squealing sound that perforates the crisp morning air

“He is not going to like this,” the main character squeaks, their voice shrill and nervous. “Undoubtedly some avatar will show up and correct your correction.”

The first writer pauses at the gate that leads into the piglet harvesting area, and makes a comically grandiose show of concern and thoughtfulness before suddenly reanimating and pushing his way into the yard.

“You have a point there, main character. Retaliation will come.” The main character looks at the first writer, face etched with concern. “You know what, today we are harvesting ducks,” he chuckles. “Might as well double down.” He walks toward a sign on the side of a small and decrepit red barn that reads: “piglets harvested inside.” Casually, the writer draws a black permanent pen from his coverall jean pocket and crosses out piglets. The main character shakes his head in wonder as the first writer scrawls the word ducks, and in an instant the squeals turn to vociferous quacking.

“Well this is going to be...” they trail off as the first writer jerks a thumb toward the duck harvesting barn. The main character, understanding that the time for a switch has come, glumly trudges into the quacking foray, like a soldier at war having accepted their fate.

6

Scores of feathered friends waddle out of the main character’s way as he wades through a sea of live poultry. There are Pekins, Khaki Campbells, and Mallards—the only three kinds of duck about which the second writer knows. It’s almost as if the present narrative is strictly limited to the confines of the second writer’s knowledge, but this thought sends a painful spasm through the brain of our poor main character, who winces. Sensing this, the second writer backs guiltily away from the fourth wall and is found, inexplicably, inside the silo, waiting.

The main character finds the second writer hunched behind a hay bale, all dolled up with black and green war paint and a duck call in his mouth. When he sees the main character approach, he waves them over. The main character is still rubbing their temples from before.

“I’m sorry about that,” the second writer says.

“Sorry about what?” the main character says as they crouch beside the second writer.

“You—?—nevermind.”

The two of them sit for a moment, looking out over the mass of flightless feather-lings that teems this way and that like a rippling rug. The quacking, now that the main character is sitting still, has died down to a happy little chatter. It’s soothing, the main character thinks, and he wonders why.

The second writer gasps, startling a dozen or more ducks in their vicinity. The main character looks over at him. “You ok?”

The second writer’s face is wide with delight. “You’re a he!” He jabs his finger repeatedly, pointing at the main character before him who has just become gendered. You’re a him!” he says.

The main character screw up his face. “What?”

“You didn’t have a gender before!”

“Yes I did.”

“No, no you didn’t! You’ve been a ‘they’! It’s been horrendously annoying to write you like that! But you just said ‘he wonders why’! And now I’m free! Ha ha!”

Frustration heats up on the main character’s face like a reddening iron. “So who the fuck is in charge of this whole thing, then, anyway?”

“What do you mean?”

The main character huffs. “That first writer—the—the—

“The Swanson fellow.”

“Yeah.” The main character snaps his fingers. “That one. He made this big fuckin’ deal about how there may have been a gaffe at the end of your last bit—” The main character’s head is suddenly searing with narrative-awareness pain and he brings his hands again to his temples. “And then he changed the piglets to ducks—” The main character vomits onto the straw-strewn floor of the silo.

The second writer looks at the main character with a mixture of surprise and pity.

Slowly, the main character collects himself and regains his composure. “He said you would be upset,” he says. “That there’d be a correction.” Panting from the exertion of it all, the main character takes deep breaths and cools down.

The second writer squints his eyes and tries to decide how much to tell him. The whole of it? He thinks. No…best go back to the beginning. The second writer places a fatherly hand on the main character’s shoulder.

“Your mother was a whore,” he begins.

7

The tinny sound of an old rotary phone cuts through the quacking. The main character swings his head this way and that, searching for the source of the sound. The second writer nods toward the far wall where the main character’s eyes rest on an old phonebooth-style phone that is loosely bolted to a wooden beam, almost as if it was an afterthought.

“I suppose that’ll be him,” the main character says defeatedly to no one in particular as he wades through the avian sea toward the ringing relic. He raises the receiver and the static-laden crackly voice reverberates, louder than expected, in his ear.

“—But she wasn’t just any whore, she was my whore.” The main character, slightly more accustomed to the leapfrog-style dialogue at this point, stands silent waiting for the rest. It comes forthright. “I loved her, but so did that damned second writer.”

The main character’s head begins to throb again, as if someone has placed a glowing ember deep in his mental psyche.

“The—the second writer?

“That’s right my boy, that foul brigand stole her away from me. We were friends god-dammit. He was my friend.” Emotion coats the first writer’s voice as his voice rises to a crackly staccato tenor through the receiver.

“My father—”

"—Your father is dead, son. Your mother was driven mad by our constant bickering, and the accompanying zig-zag narrative. It was like a dried instant ramen-noodle brick: knotted, crumbling, and in desperate need of some flavor.” The main character wonders at that last comparison, but the first writer seems to have liked it when he chose it, so he leaves it be. “Your mother ran away, though not for long. She wanted to escape the insanity. She wanted to live a life unchained by the whim of some omnipresent, omnipotent narrator, let alone two of them.

“I can understand that completely,” the main character voices dryly. His voice carries over the now quiet barn; the ducks having sensed the purported seriousness of the situation have coalesced in a corner of the space with beaks tucked into wings.

“Yes, well, one can only escape their fate for so long. When we resumed interest, we found her with child. The father was creatively dispatched in a combined narrative effort between me and El Segundo over there. One of the few times we really worked together.” From the other side of the room, the second writer casually winks in acknowledgement at this statement.

The main character stands processing this information, the receiver tightly clutched in his hands, his knuckles white from exertion. The pain in his head has receded, replaced by a calm clarity. He loosens his grip on the receiver and cocks his jaw left and right, his mind racing.

“Is there no escape then?”

“Well—ah, yes, I have another call coming in. Plus, I have done a fair bit of plot advancement.”

The voice cuts off abruptly and is replaced by the monotone buzz of the dial tone. The main character places the receiver back on its stand, and turns toward the ducks. As if in response, they unfold and return his gaze, the occasional quack quivers through the air. After a thoughtful moment, he speaks, more to the ducks than anything else.

“Right, I think it's time I find my mother.”

8

“Your name’s Jack,” El Segundo says.

Jack and El Segundo are on a greyhound, hours out of town and well into the afternoon of the next day. They haven’t eaten. They haven’t slept. After hanging up on the first writer, the main character insisted they leave right away, and the second writer obliged. He was grumbling something about the difference between plot advancement and backstory but decided to keep it between him and the fourth wall, and Jack was too consumed by his newfound mission to care about the second writer’s problems now, anyway.

“What?” Jack says.

“Your name—see? There, you already get it,” the second writer says, leaning back in his seat with a huff. He returns to staring out the window, angry but conflicted. He can’t decide whether to be proud of Jack’s development, or annoyed. For the moment, he resigns to be both.

“Why couldn’t you tell me that before?” Jack says, but El Segundo is already snoring.

Proud, annoyed, and exhausted, Jack thinks, wondering if he shouldn’t be at the helm of this wayward vessel of a story. At the idea of it—the idea of controlling his own narrative—his head begins to throb, low and steady. He massages his temples and closes his eyes against the pain. A dozen or more hours lie between him and his destination, and he needs to conserve his strength if he is to have any chance fending off the writers, should the time come. He hopes it will. He sleeps.

Universes of dreams, of wiles and wanton wishes, dance through Jack’s eyes as he slumbers. Kaleidoscopes of chaotic wonders wash in and back out again like the beckoning tides of foreign shores. He is drawn to them.

Stillness wakes him.

“We’re here,” El Segundo says. He’s stretching his stiff old arms and wiping his eyes. He yawns. “I can’t believe we’re doing this. I haven’t seen her face…in…” He sighs. “Too long.”

Jack looks at him and says nothing.

~

“You’re sure this is the right place?” Jack says, looking up and down the hallway of the apartment building. The carpet is a ghastly orange—like something you’d expect to find in a casino on the wrong side of town. He’s knocked on the door twice now and no answer.

El Segundo nods. “Me and OG…kept…tabs…kind of.”

Jack looks at him. “You stalked her.”

The second writer makes eye contact for an instant and looks quickly away, maybe a bit ashamed.

Jack shakes his head. He knocks again.

“You know, I don’t think—” Just then, the door opens with a whoosh and a colossal-sized man reaches out with both arms and pulls the two of them in by their shirts, slinging them onto the floor of the apartment, which is clouded with smoke. The big man slams the door shut behind them and Jack and El Segundo scramble to their feet.

Before they can stand, the man kicks them, one at a time, in the chest, sending them back onto the floor. Jack hits his head on the leg of a coffee table and is out like a light. His eyes close in slow motion and he is still.

El Segundo, coughing, rolls and tries once again to rise.

The big man is already on him, lifting him up and slamming him into the wall by the hallway. Frames clatter and crash to the floor around them. El Segundo sputters, and struggles to see. When he looks up—

“You,” he gasps.

“Me,” the big man says.

“How did you?—”

The big man tightens his grip, almost choking the second writer. He eyes are a glacial blue and full of rage. They bore into El Segundo’s skull. Without looking away, he nods, gesturing to the place where Jack lay. “Is that my son?” he says. It is a whisper full of ire.

El Segundo gulps, nodding. "His name is Jack."

9

A well intentioned, pixelated, high school presentation-level fade effect transports the story to a flashback…

The writers watch with grim satisfaction as their quarry trudges through the knee-deep snow, several paces ahead of them.

“I almost feel bad,” the first writer says, a cloudy vapor chasing the words from his lips like some spoken phantasm. A derisive snort is all he gets in response, and so he continues: “I said almost, you disagreeable asshole.” He lets the insult sit for perhaps too long, waiting for a response, but is only met with the sound of the arduous process of trekking through the barren, snowy wasteland that encircles them. “What exactly do you have in mind anyways?”

The second writer turns and opens his mouth to speak but is interrupted by the big man ahead of them, who has stopped and is now facing them.

“I can hear everything you two say.” He puffs the words out unevenly, clearly exhausted, “Even when I can’t…” he pauses, a conflicted look crosses his face and after some hesitation, he taps his left temple with a thickly gloved finger, “I still can.”

The first writer squints in consternation at this.

“Yes, well, that is kind of the point, isn’t it? Come now, let’s not waste any more time.” The big man remains still, obstinate in his petulance; a foreboding vein pulses gently on his forehead. The first writer glances sideways at his companion who is scrutinizing the big man ahead, intense dislike etched on his face. After several moments, the second writer rips his gaze away from the big man and signals his companion with a childish double-barrel finger-gun salute. “Christ, that’s not even the signal we agreed on.” The second writer shrugs as the first writer chuckles and cracks his knuckles. “This would be so much easier if you could contribute to the dialogue. Do you know how difficult it is to conjure backstory in a monologue?”

“Ahem,” the big man clears his throat obnoxiously.

“Oh, shut up you. I prefer your son. At least he contributes more. Or at least he will. He will ask questions.” The first writer smiles knowingly to himself at this, and for a moment, is lost in thought.

“I have a son?” The big man’s jaw is agape.

“Yes, of course, but you already knew that didn’t you?” The big man’s forehead vein, now forked, bulges grotesquely, and as if some inner neuronal switch flipped, he reluctantly replies in an almost mechanical voice.

“Ah yes, I suppose I did know that.”

“Yes, very good.” The first writer pauses, cracking his knuckles again. “We continue on until we get to the cave don’t we?” He side-eyes his cowriter who nods emphatically.

The big man’s grip slackens on the coat that he holds, tightly wrapped around his torso. He glances dumbly—face alit by the bilateral torches on the cave walls—at his new surroundings. He blinks several times, and a strange relieved look settles on his face.

“Why I didn’t do that a long time ago—” The first writer struggles to find the words. “Say why didn’t I jump here from the start?” He puzzles for a moment, the faintest trace of a headache playing at the back of his mind, and then shrugs his shoulders nonchalantly and begins to strip the layers of wet winter-clothing from his frame.

The big man eyes his two guides with a blank poker face for several moments. Then, without warning, he breaks into a face-splitting grin and approaches the two writers, arms splayed open as if he were to embrace them.

“Gentleman,” he starts, his forehead smooth in an open display of foreshadowing, “I was promised a journey by which I could find a cure for my ailing wife.” He pauses, his gaze dancing between the two narrators. The torchlight casts an ominous glint in his eyes, further adding to the obvious foreshadowing that is going on. “We have been on the road for two weeks—two very long weeks of narration, plot skips, and most of all, arguing.” He lets the last work echo off the cave walls and impatiently taps one foot, as if owed an explanation. When he receives none, he continues, carefully now. “Forgive my brashness, but I cannot help but wonder at your true intentions with me, with my wife, with this story.”

After several bewildered shared glances between the writers, the first writer speaks, hoping his voice sounds emboldened:

“You are in luck, Big Man, for we have reached the end of our—ahem—your journey.” His voice trails off at the end, as if his sentence was questioning itself. The first writer glances at his companion. The second writer looks impatient and rolls his eyes at the first writer’s failed bravado. Shaken, he continues, “I suppose you stay here, in this cave, for the rest of the story—for the rest of your life actually—and you don’t come between that woman—your wife—and myself anymore.”

A lightning quick flash of recognition dances across Big Man’s face before he quickly replaces it with stone-faced sobriety. “Is that right,” he breathes. Big Man is now wholly fixed on the second writer, who seems confused by the direct attention. “Is that right?” he repeats, now in question form. The first writer, perplexed by whatever is happening here, shifts his gaze toward the second writer, who is gingerly massaging his temples.

“Yeah, that’s right,” the first writer states, trying to sound unflinching. Failing to do so, he finishes with a: “right?” The second writer ignores his companion’s possibly rhetorical question, raising his eyes to meet the gaze of the big man until he cannot any longer. The unmistakable tension of a turning point in the plot fills the room. Nobody speaks for an entire minute. The big man maintains a steely look on his face, his bright-blue eyes locked on the second writer. A growing throb threatens to crack the first writer’s skull wide open. The second writer’s eyes are popping from their sockets as he stares at the floor. Finally, the first writer, wincing in pain, breaks the silence.

“It IS right.” Everyone’s shoulders relax and the big man smirks.

“We will see,” the big man whispers. At this, a final wave of pain, the greatest so far, washes through the first writer’s brain.

“Have fun rotting here alone,” he retorts. The first writer turns to his companion, “And just like that we were back in the city? In response, the second writer flashes his finger-guns, to the dismay of his companion, and they are gone.

~

A mismatched, cheesy screen wipe effect brings us back to the room of confrontation, where the big man, Big Man, stands, an assailant over his prey.

“It seems that you two just can’t agree on nearly anything now, can you?” The baritone of the big man’s voice hangs in the room, saturating everything it touches with dripping delicacy. With a swift punch, the second writer falls, unconscious to the floor.

The big man unceremoniously steps over the limp body of the would-be narrator and scoops up his still-unconscious son with one deft movement. He glances around for the first writer who isn’t anywhere to be seen. “Let’s go boy. Let’s go get your momma.”

The Penultimate Turn

When El Segundo comes to, Big Man and Jack are long gone. He would summon them, just like that *snap!* but it’s too late. The sky over this story has darkened, dear reader; the point of no return is well past.

Besides—Big Man doesn’t know where his wife is and neither does Jack.

Only El Segundo knows, and El Segundo’s not telling.

The second writer gets to his feet and looks around the apartment. The door, having been left open, let all the smoke out, thank God. Nevertheless, the place is dingy. El Segundo would have the smoke back if it would help obscure what he sees before him.

There’s bongs. There’s too many goddam bongs! (I should clarify. El Segundo doesn’t have a problem with bongs. He has a problem with too many goddam bongs.) Plus, take-out trash. There’s too much goddam take-out trash! (I should clarify—El Segundo—er—you get it.)

Maniacally, El Segundo chuckles to himself and puts his hands on his hips, wondering what to do next. He’s never had this kind of power before, so close to the end of things. He could burn the place down or sew it back up. Hell! He could mix metaphors if he wanted to. La dee da, dee da! He dances a little jig in Big Man’s living room. He looks like a right fool.

Suddenly, the second writer freezes like he’s heard something. He squints and peers around the room, visibly suspicious. He looks at the ceiling, then the floor. He goes to the wall and inspects the grimy paint up close. After a moment, and with great strain, he backs away, apparently not having found what he was looking for.

~

A salty breeze blows through the cabin of the ’67 Camaro, ruffling El Segundo’s quaffed hair and cooling him down from his run out of town. He checks himself in the mirror and smirks. Surf Hair, he thinks. And stolen, too. Just like this car. He grins with a chuckle and taps the steering wheel. Shifting his weight forward, he takes the smoldering stogie from his mouth and taps the ashes into a dish on the dash. He sighs and falls back into the leather seat, smiling. He’s flying down I-5 and hasn’t a care in the world.

As the miles pile up, however, and the sun begins to set, a steely kind of look comes over him and his eyes twitch. He furrows his brow, like he’s in pain—like a migraine is coming over him…it almost takes him over completely…but it passes. Without signaling, he takes Exit 33B for Carmel Valley Road and tosses the long-extinguished stogie out the window. He passes a sign. Torrey Pines State Natural Reserve: Cliffside Ocean Views at Every Turn. San Diego’s Best!

El Segundo pulls into a gravel parking lot and turns off the engine. The lot is empty but for him. That’s strange, he thinks. But it is a Monday, after all. He shrugs and gets out of the car.

~

The cliffs at Torrey Pines, despite the cheesiness of the line on that sign, are really some of San Diego’s best. Hell, they’re some of California’s best. El Segundo is lucky. He’s never seen the Pacific Ocean at the golden hour before. Hell, he’s not sure he’s seen any ocean. At any hour. He stands behind the rope and takes it all in. The word ‘expanse’ can barely capture it. It’s more like a blue cosmos. Like a blue, endless universal cosmos of water that meets the sky in magnitude.

He watches the sun dip gently towards the horizon. When it touches, he closes his eyes and takes a slow, deep breath. Slowly, he opens them. He’s full of resolve. Or he’s full of fear. He can’t tell. With one last deep breath, he reaches for the rope before him and steps over it, one foot, then the other. Shaking, he stands with his arms out for balance. The ground isn’t so even on the other side of the rope.

Leaning, he catches a glimpse over the edge. Three hundred feet below, the kind ocean water laps against the rock and sand.

It is quiet when he falls.

Halfway down, he’s somehow spun around to see the place from where he’s fallen. She’s beautiful even from this distance, he thinks.

~

“I did it,” she says to her big man as they embrace. She cries. “I did it!”

Big Man pulls back to look into Julia’s living, brown eyes. “Did what?” he says, overjoyed to see his love once again. Julia’s face is awash in the icy-blue glow of her husband’s iridescent eyes, which are frigid and only for her.

“I dispatched him,” she says. “I took care of the second writer.”

“Wait—what?” he says, but it’s more like a croak. Ever since the second writer just so happened to make Big Man’s eyes that bright white blue that one time, it only made sense that he’d be a white walker, and therefore free of that horrid cave the two writers stuck him in...the one they’d stuck him in for the rest of his life. Every time he thinks about it, he chuckles, but what Julia’s just told him is no laughing matter. “What did you do to the second writer? And how did you do anything to him? Don’t they have ultimate—like…” Big Man gestures around like he’s looking for the word. “Power? Over us?”

“Not anymore,” Julia says, more than a little pleased with herself. “We were a co-authored story, and now we’re not. There’s nothing they can do to us anymore. The second writer is dead.”

“Are you…are you sure?” he says.

“My love,” Julia says. “I changed the font. It was easy.”

Big Man’s voice catches in his throat and he slowly falls to his knees. Dread fills him. “No…” he says. “No…”

“What? This is good for us!” Julia says.

“No…” Big Man gets to his feet. He isn’t the picture of dread anymore, but the picture of alarm. “You don’t get it,” he says. “I figured it out in the cave. Their power over us came from their ability to agree on what happened to us.”

Julia’s face betrays no comprehension of what her big man is telling her.

“So if the second writer is dead…well then…then…that’s it.”

“That’s what?”

Big Man shakes his head, crestfallen in the worst way. “How many words do you have left?”

“I don’t know. Like, ten.” She shrugs. “I don’t know what the word count rule

11

The first writer leans back in his blue and white upholstered chair, pushed perhaps slightly too far from his desk, and rubs the bridge of his nose with his forefinger and thumb. He has finished rereading the second writer’s final submission and is in a somewhat somber mood. In a blatant and unabashed attempt to prolong the inevitable, he stands and sets a pot to boil, haphazardly throwing a few cinnamon sticks into the pot. Cinnamon tea, he thinks to himself as the kitchen fills with the rich, autumn aroma. When the water is reddish-brown, he cuts the gas to the stove and carefully pours roughly half of the tea into his favorite maroon mug. Scrounging through the refrigerator, he pulls a half-gallon of almond milk out and sets about pouring a precise amount into the mug. He watches carefully as the white liquid billows in clouds from the depths of the mug, lightening the contents to a tawny hazel color. Perfect he thinks, as he lifts the mug to his chin and allows steam tendrils to caress his face and warm his nostrils.

He thinks of the second writer and his timely and necessary demise. He cannot help to be saddened by it. With resolve, and hands wrapped around the warmth-providing vessel, he walks back to his desk and rests his hands into place on the keyboard.

“I like to embrace literary chaos.” The first writer jumps at the sound of the second writer, his eyes never leaving the screen in front of him. The first writer’s response is timid and spoken in his mind.

“I’m not allowed to speak for you—wait you’re dead!” In his mind’s eye, the second writer guffaws and winks at him. “Ah, our correspondence,” the first writer understands, glancing at his phone. With a nod, the second writer continues.

“Whatever it is, it is. Go with your gut. Just don’t make it a non-ending.” At this, the first writer vividly sees the second writer scrunch his nose in disgust at the idea before disapating into the nether recess of his mind. The first writer considers the words as they echo in his head. Finally, he hunches over and grabs a few loose ends, intent on tying them at last.

~

Big man and Julia are seated in the cab of a truck as it rolls smoothly down a road—it doesn’t matter which—at a leisurely pace. The sun is just beginning to rise, and the morning air is crisp as it whistles into the cab through a cracked window. One can’t help but question the symbolism of the new day, a new beginning, as the story approaches its end. Jack, seated between the two of them, finds himself marveling at the contrast between the beautiful morning in which he finds himself now, and the rainy, gloomy, dusky sunset where his story began.

After several moments of introspection, (beneficial to reader and writer alike) Jack glances at the faces of his parents. Their expressions are impassive as they stare at the road ahead. He breaks the silence.

“Aren’t you the least bit concerned?” he asks, studying their faces. They both stir at the dialogue, but say nothing to him, sharing a casual, if not slightly apprehensive look. Jack catches the look, and places it in his pocket to consider later. After a while Big Man half-turns in his seat, keeping his eyes glued to the road ahead.

“Son, what’s going to happen is going to happen,” the big man pauses, an increasingly serene look on his face, “however it happens.” Julia reaches across her son’s lap at this and squeezes Big Man’s forearm lovingly. Big Man smiles and continues driving, in no rush to get anywhere other than his destination.

Jack marvels at the journey as outside the window, the world whirls past, almost wanting to be missed…almost. He feels the warmth of his parents at his side, and a growing sense of acceptance and calm washes over him. Surprisingly he feels an appreciation for the writers, even their hijinks, and he finds himself blinking back tears. He embraces the emotion and settles into his seat, content.

Eventually, the first writer must make himself known and he does so. He chooses an average avatar sitting in a lawn chair in the middle of the road. To the passengers of the approaching truck, he appears golden, alit by the rays of the rising sun. Big Man slows the truck and stops several feet away from the first writer, killing the motor.

Julia exits first, opening the passenger door and stepping onto the asphalt. Her family follows her and they line up in an almost choreographed fashion at the front of the truck. The first writer wastes no more time, having alluded to several points already.

“Morning,” he calls. None of them answer. “I suppose you are all a bit unnerved, what with the demise of the second writer and all that.” Julia looks at her feet, uncomfortable at the mention of her sin. “Don’t squirm Julia, its OK.” Surprised, she looks up at the first writer.

“But I—I just wanted to be free.” The first writer smiles and stands from his chair.

“I hear you, I really do. I want you all to be free too.” He pauses, pleased with the surprised looks on their faces. “Yes, I suppose that your freedom was inevitable, but before we get to that, do you have any questions?”

Big Man goes first: “why aren’t you upset about the second writer?”

“That one is easy. He did it to himself. Next.”

Jack speaks next. “Didn’t my mom kill him?” At this, the first writer grins and takes a step toward the family, as if Jack had asked the correct question.

“Well yes, and no. You see this whole story was about character development and comeraderie. But—” he raises his hand cutting off Jack, who was about to ask a question—”not yours, ours. It was for us.” They look puzzled, (and so do you), so the first writer continues. “This whole thing, your story, your development, every event that took place, it was all for our own amusement and friendship.” The first writer gestures to his side, “look, see.”

The second writer appears at his side, a grotesque purple ring around his neck. He is mute and looks a bit worse for wear. Maggots crawl through his facial skin, which is grey and peeling. A raven is firmly attached to his leg and is picking at his knee. “I chose this appearance because it amuses me, nothing more.” The family of characters don’t look amused but the first writer doesn’t care. “You see, this guy here, El Segundo, he understood that it was finally time for you guys to be free, to write your own story.”

“How?” the big man’s voice cracks.

“In their imagination I suppose,” the first writer replies.

“Whose?” Jack asks.

“The reader’s, whoever is reading this right now. This is the end of my—our contribution. That doesn’t mean the story cant go on for whoever is reading. You guys can do whatever you want from here on out.”

The first writer glances around at the undesignated scenery, waiting, as this new information sinks in for the family (and the reader).

“What about the new font,” Julia pipes up.

“Now that, that was some clever writing on his part,” the first writer jerks his thumb at his companion, who is swaying gently from the motion of the raven. “It really gave the illusion that he had relinquished control,” the first writer pauses for a moment in consideration, “which I suppose he did symbolically and literally with his own death. Nice!” He chuckles at this real-time realization, mostly sure it wasn’t intended but savoring it anyways. “So you see, it is a new beginning. A new beginning for whatever you all get on with, and more importantly, a new beginning for me and this guy.” He elbows El Segundo, whose animated corpse tips over from the impact. “We are off to write something else. Same purpose, same result, new characters.”

The first writer stoops over and shoulders his companion, shooing the raven away in the process. He turns and begins to walk away from them, but pauses after several steps and turns back toward the family. “Thanks for coming up with this ending for me.”

“What?” Jack calls back. “We didn’t...”

“All that emotional shit that you had in the cab of the truck, remember, at the beginning of this last installment? The feelings of contentment and acceptance and all that? Yeah, that was just me, realizing my own ending.” He smiles at his own cleverness and then pantomimes marionnette strings over the corpse on his shoulder. He raises one hand and pretends to cut the strings with scissors. “Be free!”

The end.