A warm fall day greets the last flea market of the season in Francine's neighborhood. A parking lot near Purgatory hosts twenty or so vendors who have hauled out various assortments of antiques, collectibles, and, um, junk for passerbys to pick through. Mixed in with the more traditional cleaning out the closet vendors are a few eccentrics like the young balding poet who for a dollar will write verse insulting you. As Francine and Jake pass by holding hands, Jake asks Francine, "So, how'd you ever handle Bruce Goose?"
"Your friend, the poet? I just emailed him back and politely told him I didn't publish poetry and wished him the best of luck in placing his poems elsewhere."
"And that was it?"
"Nope. He still sent me more poems. He sent me a whole ebook collection in fact. It was called If You Haven't Been Offended Yet, Then Please Keep Reading And You Will Be."
"And were you?"
"Yes, I was. Not so much by the subject matter but by some of the rhymes. Anyone who still rhymes 'fire' with 'desire' should be beaten with a Doors album."
"I kind of liked the ode he wrote to his penis though."
"He sent you the book as well?"
"Yeah, he emailed me and thanked me for helping him get published. I think that was before you rejected him though. I just hit 'reply', wrote a bunch of email headerlike gobbledygook and pretended the email was one that got bounced back to him. It seems to have worked, I haven't heard from him since."
"Clever."
"Hey! Some old wrestling magazines!" Jake says, drops Francine's hand, and starts rooting through a pile of magazines on a cardtable that is so shaky it appears to be drunk.
"How much?" Jake asks their owner, a man who sits in a lawnchair drinking Mexican beer.
"A dollar each, dude," the man says and then takes a glug of beer.
"Hmm . . ." Jake says, his enthusiasm dropping, though the one with The Waffle Warrior reenacting The Last Supper (retitled The Last Breakfast) on the cover is pretty intriguing.
Sensing a sale slipping south, the man in the lawnchair says, "Dude, I tell you what. I like your taste in reading, so for you, fifty cents a piece. Fuck it, the world's ending soon anyway."
"Uh, thanks," Jake says, and digs out a dollar.
Jake buys the one with The Waffle Warrior cover and another one with The Optimist and The Pessimist on the cover arguing over how much water is in a glass.
Jake thanks the man, and picks up Francine's hand again.
Holding her hand, he doesn't much care what happens to the rest of the world.
Lovers are fucking selfish like that.
Blog Love Omega Glee is a novel by Wred Fright about two bloggers who fall in love while the world falls apart, which is being serialized on his blog. To start reading from the beginning or read another installment, please visit Blog Love Omega Glee Central on WredFright.Com. If you like what you've read, or you've read all of Blog Love Omega Glee and want more Fright, then please read his first novel.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
0 comments:
Post a Comment