Date:         Tue, 19 Oct 1999 10:31:51 -0600
From: Robyn Herrington <rmherrin@UCALGARY.CA>
Organization: University of Calgary
Subject:      [WRITERS] SUB: HALLOWEEN CONTEST: Writer

Writer
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"Hello, having fun?"
He was fairly cute. And I'd had a crappy week, and to top it off, none of my
girlfriends had turned up tonight. Friday night, and here I was, attempting
to have fun on my own in the big city. I knew it would be a disaster. No
woman ever goes out on her own on a Friday night unless she's desperate or
looking for a really lousy time. Not in this area.
But he was fairly cute. And I was feeling lonely. So I thought, 'What the
hell?' and gave him an opening to see what he'd do with it. "Maybe. How
'bout you?"
        "Oh yes, I'm having a marvellous time. Really cutting loose and
letting go for the first time in many a while." He had deep, dark eyes,
brown, maybe even black, it was hard to tell. Dark brown hair, cut short
over a friendly face, high cheekbones and an almost too wide smile. He
looked dangerous, but felt safe. I decided he was more than cute, and gave
him room to continue.
        "Yeah? You been working too hard or what?" I turned towards him,
just a little. Leaning up against the bar where I'd been standing when he
first spoke. Showing just enough interest to let him know there was
something maybe worth putting in a little effort for.
        "Working? Oh yes, working harder than is right or proper for any
human being. You have just no idea." I liked the way he spoke. He didn't
have an accent, but still managed to sound like an English gentleman.
"Yeah, tell me about it. We work like dogs, and drop like flies. And for
what? I still haven't figured that out."
        "Indeed. There seems to be so much more work than reward in this
age, and yet most people seem to accept it. It's the way things are, so it's
the way things must be."
        I turned closer towards him. It's not often you meet somebody who's
not only more than cute, but also has a brain, these days. Maybe I'd lucked
out, for just once in my life. Would my friends be just so jealous, or what?
"You know, you're right! We work harder, because we think that's what we
should do, but we never stop to wonder 'why'? What's the point of all this
hard work, when all it gives us is even more work to do, to be done? What's
it all for?"
        "Precisely. What IS it all for?" He signalled to the bartender and
ordered us both refills. I hadn't even realised my glass was empty, but I
wasn't about to argue. "You're a personal assistant, correct? A new name for
an old secretarial position?"
        "Yeah. I guess it shows, huh? Lots of guys work that out. Must be
the hair, or the shoes or something."
        "Something." He winked, and handed me a fresh glass of wine. I took
a sip and boy, was it good! This was the expensive stuff, real class. Not
the cheap hooch I'd been drinking.
        I half drained my glass before I spoke again, taking the opportunity
to study him. I couldn't quite work it out. He wasn't gorgeous, but he was
good looking. He wasn't attractive, but he was interesting. He wasn't
incredibly well dressed, but he had it together. You know what I mean? "So
what do you do? When you're not hanging out in wine bars, that is?"
        "I'm a writer."
        "Wow. A writer." I had no idea what that meant, but it sounded
fascinating. Writers didn't have bosses and desks and schedules and orders
and deadlines and office politics and power dressing go-getters half their
age, to contend with. All they had to do was put words onto paper. How hard
was that?
        "Yes." He took a gentle sip of his wine, and gazed round the bar, as
if losing interest in me.
        I didn't really know why, but I felt I had to draw his attention
back to me. Hey, he was a writer, and I'm just a P.A. I needed some mystery
in my life, and there's not much more mysterious than writers. "So what do
you write? Anything I'd know?"
        "Well, I don't believe so." He didn't even look at me as he spoke.
Just sent his dark gaze around and through the people in the bar.
        "Hey, you don't know me. You don't know what I read." I don't know
if I was angry, or just lonely. Probably some combination of the two. "So
tell me, give me a hint here." I reached out and took hold of his arm, just
above the elbow. His shirt disguised it, but he had awesome biceps hidden
away.
        He turned and looked at me, a deep look. Not one of those looks you
get in these places. Not a look of 'do I stand a chance?' or 'is she worth
the effort?' This was a look that went right through me, inside me, turned
me inside out and upside down. This was a look that made me feel like I was
a real person. Not just a piece of nicely shaped meat laid out for viewing
and possible consumption.  "You really want to know?"
        I felt like I was at a turning point, a crossroads. I had the
opportunity to say one thing, and go one way with my lonely, crazy, boring
life. Or I could say something else, and take a turn to somewhere strange
and unreal. One direction led to a daily commute; two trains and a block
walk; a tiny apartment with a lousy view; maybe a half decent man a few
years from now; maybe some half decent kids; a half decent life. The other
way led to somewhere unfamiliar, unknown. Unknowable.
        I didn't even think about it. "Yeah, I want to know. So tell me."
        He looked down into his glass, as though seeking inspiration, or the
right words. Then looked up at me, taking a deep breath before speaking.
"I'm a writer. I wrote this."
        "Wrote what?"
        He shrugged and gestured vaguely around us. "This. All of this. I
wrote this bar, the people in it."
        "You've put this bar into a book?"
        "No. This bar IS in a book. Or it will be if I ever got around to
finishing it."
        I looked around the room. People were drinking and talking, the same
as ever. Some were waiting for others, some had given up waiting and were
just being. Nothing had changed, nothing was any different, nothing was
interesting or exciting. "I'm not sure I follow you."
        "This bar, this night, this whole evening. It's all something I've
written."
        "You're a psychic? You write things down and then they happen?" That
could be interesting. I dated a psychic once. He always wanted to read my
palms. It turned out he just wanted to look down my cleavage, and couldn't
tell a lifeline from a headline. But that's not the point. Psychics are
interesting, even the fakes.
        "No, if I could tell the future I wouldn't need to write things. I'd
just live them. I'm no more psychic than you are."
        "So what do you mean then?" I was starting to regret giving him the
opening. He was still cute, still had those cheekbones, but was turning into
just another late night weirdo.
        He sighed visibly and stared at me. Ok, he was a weirdo, but he had
beautiful, dark, soulful eyes. "Everything that's happened here tonight,
everything that's happening, is all something I'm writing."
        I finished my wine while contemplating what he'd said. "So you're
saying all the people in this bar are just characters in a story you're
writing? That's a new one." I placed my empty glass on the bar with an over
exaggerated motion, but he didn't seem to notice.
        "That's exactly it." He waved an arm through the air. "All these
people are just characters. Admittedly most of them are very much cardboard,
but they're just background, filler for the real story."
        I toyed with my wineglass, running a finger around its rim, trying
to draw his attention towards its emptiness. "So what's the real story?"
        With a twitch, he noticed my empty glass and ordered up a refill.
While he was occupied I took a moment to glance at the other people in the
bar. He was right, they were just background filler. Absent, pretty people
who just filled up space, without actually contributing anything. The women
were all attractive, but nondescript. The men were all the same predatory,
office suited types I'd seen far too many times. They all had faces I'd seen
a thousand times before, but there was nobody I specifically recognised as
having seen before that day. I felt a brief shimmer of, I don't know, shock,
surprise, consternation? It ran through my bones, and I shivered quickly,
before remembering that this was no different to any other night. The
pretty, vacant people were always here, always had been, and always would
be. The world was always filled with background people; it didn't mean the
world was just another scene in a trashy novel. It just meant that trashy
novels were closer to the world than people cared to admit.
        "The real story? That's what I'm working on right now." He paid the
bartender and handed me a new glass of wine. I sipped it delicately, slowly,
deciding that I didn't want to get drunk tonight. Not with him, no matter
what his cheekbones were like.
        "Don't you know what the story is that you're writing?"
        "Not really." He took a deep drink from his own glass. "When a story
idea comes to me, I know where it starts, and I know where I want it to take
me. But when I get going, I rarely end up where I was expecting to be, and
the journey itself is always a surprise."
"Sounds like a drag really. I hate not knowing where I'm going."
"Sometimes the destination turns out to be other than what I was hoping,
yes. But other times, the destination is more wondrous than any I had ever
imagined. That is the penance and the reward of being a writer."
His speech was starting to get a little too flowery for me. I drained my
glass and shifted on my barstool, placing one foot firmly on the floor.
"Well, thanks for the drink, and the conversation. I really gotta go now,
though."
He nodded and waved with his left hand. "Why don't you stop a while longer,
and talk with me? I'm enjoying your company."
I moved to stand, but changed my mind and swung back down onto the stool.
"Ok, so long as you're buying. There's no harm in a little late night chat."
He waved the bartender over for a refill while I made myself comfortable.
"I'm glad you've decided to stay, thankyou."
"Well, it's not really like me. But you're a nice guy, I guess. A girl could
do a lot worse." I was taking a mouthful of wine when a thought hit me. This
really WAS not like me. I swallowed the wine and stared at him, a bizarre
thought surfacing in my mind. "You said everyone here tonight is just a
character in a story you're writing. Does that include me?"
He didn't look at me, preferring instead to gaze into his drink, as he
spoke. "Everyone. The background characters, the bartender. You."
"I don't know what kinda weird line this is, but I'm no character in a
story. I'm real, I feel real, I think real thoughts. I have a real life. I
know who I am."
"Of course you do. That's the way I wrote you. You're my main character; of
course you're going to be more real than anybody else here. You have a
background, ideals, dreams. You're more rounded than anyone here."
Then it hit me. The way he said rounded, he wasn't referring to my
background, or my personality. He was even looking at my chest as he spoke.
This was all some crazy line. He wanted to disorient me, make me feel unreal
so he could do what he wanted to me. What a sicko. Why do the good-looking
ones turn out to be sickos? It's just not fair.
"Look buster, I don't know what you think's going to happen tonight, but
you're way out of luck. I'm not interested in you, or your stories, or your
weird fantasy world anymore." I slipped off the stool and stood up straight.
"You can claim you're the King of England for all I care, I'm leaving."
"Please, don't go." His voice was so quiet, so sad, that my anger faded and
I turned back to look at him. His posture had slumped somehow; he didn't
look quite so confident and cute as he had done earlier.
"Hey, if you're writing me, you can make me do what you want, right?" I
dismissed the urge to rejoin him at the bar. A sad loser is still a loser.
"If only I could. It's my subconscious, I think. I told you I know where I
start, and where I want to end up. But somehow the story rarely takes me
there. I started with you here in this bar, and was hoping to write the two
of us to somewhere fun and exciting. But it hasn't happened. You're leaving,
and I'm stuck here, wondering where I went wrong."
"I'll tell you where you went wrong. Never tell a girl she isn't real. We
don't like that." I turned and strode positively towards the exit. If I
didn't look back, he wouldn't follow me. That's the way it worked. I hoped.
I reached for the door handle, and suddenly he was there, beside me,
blocking the way. I don't know how he covered the distance from the bar to
the door without my seeing, but there he was. "Now what?"
"You shouldn't leave. I've only written the bar, I haven't come up with
anything for outside, yet. I don't even know what city this is supposed to
be set in."
I didn't really know how to respond to that. "Look, I don't know what
medication you're on, whether it ran out, or you took too much, or what. But
you can either let me leave, or you can spit teeth. You decide." I hadn't
been taking kickboxing class for the last three years for nothing.
He studied my face, and moved away from the door. He looked so sad, and
vulnerable, I nearly changed my mind. But I'd worked my way up to a big
exit, so I figured I really should take it. There are two things that make a
really girl stand out in a man's memory. A big entrance, and a big exit. I
pulled the door open with a swift motion, feeling the cold night air blow in
around me. I stepped through and looked out into the dark evening before
glancing behind me. He was walking back towards the bar, not sparing any
more attention for me, dismissing me as though I didn't exist. I felt
disappointed, he'd tried so hard, come up with such a unique story, but now
it was over, a real anti-climax. But that was good, I didn't want him to
follow me. I didn't want anything more to do with him. Didn't I? I turned
and looked out into the dark night.
What if it wasn't just a line? What if I was just a character in a story he
was writing? What would happen to me when I left? Would I disappear, never
to be written again? Or would I continue about my life, maybe continuing the
story by leaving. I felt a coldness that wasn't connected with the evening
air. Was I real? How could I tell? I could be written to think and feel
anything. I could be written to remember my past, to know my friends, to
feel alive and human. I could be written to feel and do anything at all. So
why would I be written to wonder if I was being written or not? Wouldn't
that be cruel? He didn't seem cruel, just lonely, and a little confused.
Maybe he was being written as well? Somewhere there's an author, writing
this all down, making me think and feel these things, making the man at the
bar think and feel and speak. Working us all like puppets, like stick
figures in the corner of a paperback book. Drawing out our lives then
playing them over and over with a flick of a thumb.
Or maybe I've just had a little too much to drink, and the weirdo at the bar
has affected me more than I thought. I turned my back on the bar, and
stepped into the dark night. Into whatever awaited, reality, or oblivion.

The End
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Robyn Herrington                                rmherrin@ucalgary.ca
Editor: New Currents in Teaching and Learning/InfoServe
University of Calgary                           Ph: 220-2561

Leadership lifts a person's vision to higher sites, raises a person's
performance to higher standards, and builds a personality beyond its normal
limitations - Peter Drucker
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