Short Scene - First and Third Person Narrative

These are two perspectives on the same short scene I've written. Again, focus was on believability and authenticity.

1. Third Person

They stood in the dim orange light next to her red Chevy Cobalt and embraced. Sean looked down over her shoulder and stared down amused with the two, black rimmed, spare tires that had replaced her two left wheels, knowing well there was a third on the other side as well. It was almost eleven and they each had a 45-minute drive home in opposite directions.

They broke from the hug slowly, as if trying to prolong the window of opportunity for a kiss. Alex wanted a kiss, and tried to engage eye contact as they parted. Sean was still looking at the wheels until they disappeared behind her as he straightened up. He looked at her with a rather neutral expression. The hug began with smiles, though his faded quickly once hidden from view. Alex’s remained. There was a moment when his eyes caught her persistent, desperate glare and she said, “You okay to drive?”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m good,” he responded casually in a slightly hurried manner. His hands were now in his pockets. He was beginning to rock forward and back impatiently.

Alex’s smile was reduced to barely more than pursed lips and she gave a single nod “’Kay. Well, thanks again,” she said raising her right hand that was anchored at the elbow by her purse to wave “bye”. She resigned her hope and turned towards her car.

“Of course,” Sean replied, already stepping backwards and raising his hand. “Take care.” Alex didn’t want to respond, frustrated and annoyed with Sean’s inadequate chivalry. Though, a kiss had never been his intention.

The second Alex’s head had turned completely, Sean quickly turned around and walked down the row of cars with strides just slightly larger and more enthusiastic than normal. He puffed out his cheeks and exhaled as he reached for the phone in his pocket. He slid his thumb across the screen to unlock it and saw three messages from +1 (310) 555-1702. He had deleted the contact almost two months ago, but hadn’t blocked it. He tapped the text conversation to open it and slowed his walk to read it. 

2. First Person

Even this felt like too much. I tried to keep my distance. The hug was all shoulders and arms. Pressing our torsos closer together would have sent the wrong message—that I was actually interested. I was trying to be a good date, or at least give that impression. I looked down at her tiny black-rimmed wheels. Alex’s car was rather small, but the wheels made it resemble a circus elephant riding a tricycle.

She’d told me not too look at them. “I have three,” she had said earlier, “There’s another on the other side,” I withheld my comments about them.  She probably thought it was good small talk, and in most cases it probably was, but I was in no rush to prolong our goodbyes.

After counting a few beats, I withdrew from the hug. It was probably too soon. Her grip relaxed just late enough to let me know that I’d caught her off guard. The sincerity of my courtesies had been gradually waning throughout the night and at this point I was just going through the motions trying to hit all the formalities. Hug—check.

I caught her eyes looking at me as we straightened up. In all honesty I’d felt her looking at me sooner but was reluctant to oblige her with eye contact. I knew she wanted a kiss. After all, we had no trouble swapping whiskey-flavored saliva two weeks prior on New Years Eve. But circumstances were different then. I was newly single, and my “It’s 12:30 and I still haven’t had a New Years kiss,” line hadn’t been brought down from the rafters and dusted off in almost four years—though it’s potency was sharp as ever.

She was still smiling at me and said, “You okay to drive?”

The prospect of getting in my car and leaving sparked my excitement and relief. This whole charade was almost over. “Yeah yeah, I’m good,” I quickly and eagerly replied. My hands were in my pockets now; their work was done for the night.

She closed her smile a bit and nodded once—conceding defeat. “’Kay. Well, thanks again,” she said raising her hand as an abbreviated wave.

Her wave felt like the final bell releasing students for the summer. I withdrew my hand from its holster and returned a wave. “Of course,” I said, my excitement probably feigning sincerity. “Take care,” I concluded. A mental countdown started in my head as she began to turn towards her car. 3…2…1…

The moment I was out of her peripheral view, I spun around and headed back across the parking lot towards my car. I exhaled and let the relief wash over me. Then I reached for the phone in my pocket. I knew with certainty that there would be messages waiting—messages that shouldn’t be opened in front of my “date”. I looked at the screen and saw three new text messages from a phone number rather than a contact. I knew who it was. I had always known. When I had removed her from my contact list two months ago my intentions were to have no way of contacting her since I rarely remembered phone numbers. This number had been in my phone for almost four years and I’d never once memorized past the area code. It was always masked by the name “Ash”.

Writing Sample - First Person Narrative

This is a brief story demonstrating the first person POV. I tried to have fun with this one.

Abortion has never been a term to evoke much emotion from me. I have no religious beliefs—never have. It’s not something on my radar if I’m honest. I hear the arguments, see the hostility, and none of it bothers me one way or the other. I have my beliefs, and I’m satisfied with them. I’ve also been blessed to have a girlfriend that had always shared those beliefs, despite her religious family. We’ve always agreed that it was in everyone’s best interest, if it were ever required, to “terminate” the pregnancy. This was never much of a discussion.

Earlier we had been at a friend’s house watching a stupid Disney movie. They were all into that garbage—Kat, Kevin, and his girlfriend. I was driving that night, so when Kat and I finally got back to my house and I was relieved of my duty, I treated myself to the usual glass of Jameson. I thought Jameson was garbage. In Dublin I thought it was garbage, in Chapel Hill I thought it was garbage, and in Los Angeles I thought it was garbage. Kat loved it. She had coincidentally been on the same tour of the Jameson distillery as I had in Dublin, only a year later. We even had the same tour guide—Sean. I always got the impression that she came back thinking Jameson was the shit because of its bullshit “tradition”. I didn’t even have a preference for a particular whisky, and it was pretty much all I drank, and I still hated Jameson. That’s how I knew it was shit.

“Drink a water. I just bought a new pack.” I told her, probably too enthusiastically. She obliged but didn’t return the enthusiasm. The night had gone perfectly fine. We’d laughed, and joked, and had fun with our friends. But she was a little off now, and I knew why, but I ignored it. “Keep drinking. Come on!” I encouraged. She was taking one big gulp, holding it in her mouth, then forcing it down. I was hoping for more of a chugging action. “You only need five seconds’ worth.”

She had peed at the Ralphs by my house. I was annoyed at her eagerness to relieve herself given the nature of our impromptu shopping trip. She had run straight to the bathroom in the back of the store, while I perused the candy aisle conveniently located right outside of it. I grabbed some gummies—the kind shaped like hamburgers, and hotdogs, and pizzas. Then I waited. When she finally emerged, we both understood which of the two possible options that particular amount of bathroom time indicated. Normally I would have commented on it, or she would have beat me to it. We continued on. One thing was left on the list—the only thing really.

Back at home, that one thing was now an empty pink box torn open on my dining room table. There were instructions unfolded and laid haphazardly—instructions that she had bitched through the entire time I was reading, claiming to “already know” what they said. She seems to “already know” a lot of things. Sometimes she’s right, but a lot of times she’s wrong. I wasn’t going to chance it with this one.

At this point she was in the guest bathroom, with the faucet running, shower on, and music playing from the speaker on her phone. We went through fairly extravagant measures to mask our business in the bathroom. I was waiting on the couch, a little nervous about her silence. She would normally be yelling things to me from the bathroom, saying funny things, providing commentary, and so on. Then suddenly she yelled “Oh shit!”

I was confused because I knew that wouldn’t be her reaction to the news we were, or weren’t expecting. “What?” I called back, getting up from the couch. She didn’t respond. Now outside the bathroom door I continued, “What happened?”

“I dropped the cup,” she replied.

“How? Did it spill everywhere?”

“No, like, in the toilet,” she answered.

I could hear things rustling about behind the door. I figured there were way too many uncomfortable things going on at once in that particular moment so I remained outside. “Jesus. Okay well don’t flush it, it’s plastic.” I urged. These were the kind of things that she unfathomably required emphasis on. Of course, this was all said over the sound of a flushing toilet.

“Shit. Wait. Fuck,” she didn’t really need to say much more than that.

She finally opened the door and came out, blocking my view of the toilet with her body. I wasn’t going to look anyway—I didn’t need to. There was never that definitive gulping noise when a toilet bowl has been completely evacuated.

“Just pee right on the stick this time,” I insisted, handing her the second of the three tests. She looked at me as if I didn’t need to say that. She gives me that look often. I wish she was self-aware enough to grasp that for every redundant, unnecessary statement, there are ten that should be redundant and unnecessary, but aren’t.

After forcing her to drink some more water and waiting awkwardly for ten minutes, she wound up in the master bathroom. I remained on the couch. A couple minutes passed. At this point I was more curious about how things were going in there, rather than the actual result. I finally heard the door open.

“Well,” she yelled down the hall.

“That wasn’t even three minutes,” I yelled back. I got up quickly and jogged to my bedroom where she was standing with the bathroom door open. Her hands were empty. She was silent. I looked at her face and she had the same teary-eyed look of numbness that I’d only seen when we almost broke up six months ago. She didn’t really need to say anything. I paused, “Are you sure you read it right?”

Writing Blurb for Don't Panic! Online

I was asked to submit a short blurb on a current but unique topic for the online magazine Don't Panic! Final edits were not done by me personally.

Last Saturday, to celebrate the release of their latest album “Christmas Songs”, Los Angeles punk veterans Bad Religion offered to make a 50 cent donation to a local Food Bank for every visit their website received. The lack of effort required to help the poor was commendable, and the clicks began to roll in. Right up until those circle-jerking betas over at Reddit got their sticky fingers all over the link.

Between discussions over child abuse and being in the Friendzone, one user found time to post the link. Thousands of upvotes later, BadReligion.com found itself totally fucked by Reddit’s otherwise virginal hard-on. The website promptly crashed, preventing any further visits and potential donations. Users righteously bragged that Bad Religion didn't 'know what Reddit is capable of', an odd statement, seeing as events like the Boston bombing proved that they're only capable of being completely retarded. The website was revived shortly thereafter, but this incident raises a peculiar question, if even the internet fails us, what is the most efficient way to give back this Christmas?

First, lets congratulate the over-zealous and laughably predictable internet community (myself included, admittedly) for simultaneously crippling the band’s charitable efforts and emptying stomachs of the poor. In light of these actions, let's consider an equally excitable alternative: getting shit-faced drunk. 

Do you know that Heineken donate over 1% of all profits to charitable partners (over $29 million in 2012)? Immune to the inevitable digital battering, drinking beer in the name of charity does not fall victim to its own success, as have the efforts of Bad Religion. What's more, the more beer you drink, the more likely you are to continue reaching into those deep pockets of yours. So get off Reddit and go boozing with some friends. It might help more than just your social life.

ps. Dear Heineken, pls give us free booze for this festive plug. Thanks

Link to full article

Mock Video Game Writing Sample - Dialogue

This is a writing sample I've put together demonstration video game applications of creative writing. Specifically in this one, I've focused on basic plot and character foundations, along with three dialogue samples. I wanted the voices to be real, and authentic--conducive to the story and not distracting.

Mock Game Dialogue Sample

Brief Game Premise:

The game is a mystery-thriller that follows a middle-aged doctor as he investigates the bombing of his abortion clinic in suburban Texas. Along the way he encounters hostile militant activists belonging to the underground ultra-conservative terrorist organization responsible for the attack. As the game progresses, it is revealed that the terrorist organization is secretly and deeply rooted throughout the local community.

Background:

Dr. Richard “Rich” Decker is a 44-year-old OB/GYN specializing in pregnancy termination (abortions). For eight years, Dr. Decker had practiced at Huntington Memorial Hospital’s maternity ward in Pasadena, CA until complications with his youngest son’s Cerebral Palsy forced his family of five to relocate. The doctor, his wife Violet (“Vi”), and their three children—Sean, Abby, and Owen—left California and settled in Friendswood, a small suburb in the Greater Houston area. When the conservative social and political climate in their new neighborhood made finding employment impossible given the nature of his work, Richard opened a private sexual and reproductive healthcare clinic. Despite its controversial reputation in the local community, the clinic was moderately successful until it was leveled by an explosion just minutes before the doctor was scheduled to arrive for appointments. Corrupted by their affiliations with fundamentalist “interest” groups, the local authorities show little interest in resolving the matter justly. Now Richard faces leaving his family behind as he searches for information that will lead him to the attackers, before they come after him.

Character Profiles:

Dr. Richard Decker – Middle-aged abortion specialist, father of three, realist, book smart, jaded by life’s circumstances but invigorated by dangers to his family and well-being.

Tradition for America (TFA) – Traditionalist and fundamentalist terrorist organization rooted throughout local communities. Founded and lead by Ken Spitz and his wife Katrina.

Violet Decker – Wife of Dr. Decker, hard-working mother but exhausted with home life, displeased with husband’s lack of attention towards family, short-tempered, snarky.

Chief Timothy Whitman – Chief of Friendswood PD, experienced and decorated, important intermediary between TFA and local law enforcement.

Agent Samantha Foster – Federal Agent designated to overseeing investigative proceedings following TFA attack, diligent, clever, but involvement bound by federal red tape.

Fr. Robert Flick – Local clergy, prominent community leader, liaison between TFA and local community, well respected.

Det. Jim Clarkson – Senior Detective presiding over the investigation. Privy and adherent to TFA influence.

Officer Lawrence Delagardelle – Young officer of Friendswood PD, suspicious of PD senior officers, committed to aiding Dr. Decker and his family, and bringing justice to the community.

Ken Spitz – Founder and leader of TFA.  Calm, calculated, influential, manipulative.

Katrina Spitz – Wife of Ken Spitz and second in command of TFA. Ruthless, hot-tempered, irrational, unpredictable.

Dialogue 1: Dr. Decker and his wife argue in the living room as he plans to track down the bomber.

VI: Are you out of your fucking mind?!

RICHARD: Jesus Vi, the kids…

Richard motions upstairs with his hand at Violet’s swearing.

VI:  What, now you care about the kids?

RICHARD:  I’m doing this for the kids!

VI:  How is this for the kids! Leaving them so you can run after some punk—

RICHARD: These are terrorists! This isn’t some fucking game.

VI: Yes it is! It is a fucking game to you! They tagged you and now you’re it.

RICHARD: Nobody is ‘it’! It’s not like someone’s winning or losing.

VI: We’re all losing Richard! We’re losing a husband and a father. For God’s sake Rich, Owen needs you here.

RICHARD: He’ll be fine. You can handle it.

VI: I can handle it? What, am I their fucking babysitter? Is this house a fucking daycare?! You’re their father—

RICHARD: And you’re their mother! You—

VI: I’m your wife Richard!

RICHARD: Vi…

VI: I need you here. They need you here. You’re not—

RICHARD: Vi, listen.

VI: You’re not a cop Richard! This isn’t your job. Your job is—

RICHARD:  My job is a pile of ashes and rubble because some asshole—

VI: Your job is to take care of us!

RICHARD: Well I can’t do that if these people go free! Vi, don’t you understand I have to find out who did this or we’re all targets—we’re all in danger.

VI: But mister Clarkson said—

RICHARD: The police aren’t going to help, Vi! They don’t care about us; they want us gone. Clarkson isn’t going to do shit.

VI: But he said they would find—

RICHARD: They aren’t going to find anything! They aren’t even looking. This is the fucking Bible Belt, this isn’t California—it’s not the same.

VI: So what are you going to do if you find them?

RICHARD: I don’t—

VI: Kill them? Are you going to kill—

RICHARD: I don’t know!

VI: Well, what if they kill you?

Dialogue #2: Ken and Katrina Spitz, leaders of Tradition for America, confront Chief Whitman about Officer Delagardelle’s involvement with Dr. Decker.

KEN: Who’s his little friend?

WHITMAN: Who?

KEN:  Decker’s friend—the black guy. Tall, some kind of thing on his face, good look—

Katrina looks at Ken in disgust.

WHITMAN: Lawrence.

KEN: Lawrence?

WHITMAN: Yeah, Lawrence uh Delagardelle. He’s a pup, ya’ know, he’s a little wet behind the ears.

KEN: Is he a problem, this Lawrence Delagardelle?

WHITMAN: Nah, no, not at all. I’ll have Clarkson talk to him—tell him to leave it alone. It’s nothing. He’s nothing. He just uh…

KEN: He doesn’t seem like nothing. It seems to me like he’s doing a lot of talking—talking to people he shouldn’t be talking to, about things he shouldn’t be talking about.

WHITMAN: Lawrence? Yeah, I mean, he’s new. He just wants to wet his beak a little, that’s all. He’s not a problem.

KATRINA: He just gave up Robert!

WHITMAN: Father Flick?

KATRINA: No shit you fucking moron! And let me remind you: If Decker gets to Flick, Decker gets to you. And if Decker gets to you, Decker gets to us. Now doesn’t that sound like a fucking problem to you?! Don’t you think that might be a little alarming to us, here, where we do business with shits like you, and pay shits like you, to keep other little shits out of our fucking hair!

KEN: Alright Kat…

WHITMAN: Look he’s fine, everything’s fine. He’s not going to—

KATRINA (Cont.): And don’t you think that when little shits like you, who work for us, do an especially shitty job, they should be fired? Huh? Isn’t that how this works? I’m the boss and you’re the little bitch mopping the floors and if you can’t keep these floors fucking sparkling, you’re gone. Except here, at this company, we don’t fire incompetent little shits like you—we kill them.

KEN: Katrina! Enough!

Katrina looks at Ken in annoyance.

KEN (cont’d):  Look Tim, we pay you to keep all your little duckies in a row. Sometimes a little duckie gets out of line, and that little duckie can cause us problems. He runs around—

WHITMAN: He’s not causing any—

Ken puts his hand on the table signaling for Whitman to be quiet.

KEN: Tim. You’re not listening to me. That little duckie runs around quacking about, making a ruckus. Now I don’t know about you, but I hate noise. I can’t sleep, I can’t think with all this quacking, and quacking, and quacking…

WHITMAN: I told you, Clarkson will talk to him. What do you want me to do?

KEN:  Get all your little duckies in a row—every last one—so that we can sleep, and think, and do all the wonderful things that we need to do to keep you happy, and your wife happy, and your kids happy.

Whitman is irked by the mention of his family. He reluctantly stands up to conclude the conversation.

KEN:  Oh and Tim…

Whitman freezes.

KEN (cont.): Katrina wasn’t kidding.

WHITMAN: About Father Flick?

KEN: About killing you.

Dialogue #3: Whitman and Clarkson speak in his office after statements made by Officer Delagardelle on local news following his expulsion from the police department implicate them with TFA and the bombing. Whitman grows impatient with Clarkson’s incompetence and is coming undone beneath the pressure from Ken and Katrina.

CLARKSON: What are we gonna do about this boss?

WHITMAN: We? No, no. There is no “we”. This is on you…

CLARKSON:  How is this on m—

WHITMAN:  If you did what you were fucking told, what you were paid to do, this wouldn’t have happened.

CLARKSON: I did exactly wha—

WHITMAN:  If you took care of this situation more like a senior officer and less like an incompetent, worthless piece of shit…

CLARKSON:  I told you, I did exactly what you said! Exactly. I reassigned him to the Bilesky case, just like you said.

WHITMAN:  Well then why was he still snooping around Decker? Why was he at his house? Why—

CLARKSON: I don’t know! Look Tim, man to man, we know this situation is fucked. This whole thing is fucked. Okay, I get it. Now we can argue about it all night but that ain’t gonna fix it.

WHITMAN:  So how do we fix it?

CLARKSON:  C’mon Tim, you know the answer to that.

The two men lock eyes momentarily in understanding. Whitman shakes his head.

WHITMAN:  No. No way. It’s too obvious.

CLARKSON:  What’s too obvious?

WHITMAN:  That’s too obvious. It’s too easy to trace back. We could never cover that up with Agent Foster up our asses the way she has been.

CLARKSON:  So we don’t do it. Maybe someone else does it.

WHITMAN:  Who? We can’t trust anyone else. If someone with TFA affiliations gets caught, they’ll know it was us. Delagardelle just told the entire county that he had reason to believe we were in TFA pockets. Then all of a sudden he goes missing and the suspect turns up TFA?

CLARKSON:  So then who?

They pause in thought.

WHITMAN:  Flick.

CLARKSON:  Jesus Tim…

WHITMAN:  Exactly. He could do it.

CLARKSON:  Are you out of your damn mind? We can’t ask Father Flick to—

WHITMAN:  Sure we can. His ass is as much on the line with TFA as ours. If not him, then who?

Clarkson pauses in contemplation.

CLARKSON:  He won’t do it. There’s no way he would.

WHITMAN:  He has to. He doesn’t have a choice.

CLARKSON:  What do you mean he doesn’t have a choice? Yes he d—

WHITMAN:  Ken gave Father Flick almost three million dollars of TFA money to launder into the church. He was supposed to make renovations and what not—you know, spruce it up a bit.

CLARKSON: Yeah, have you seen the place? It’s gorgeous.

WHITMAN:  Oh, it is, it really is. The new ceiling, the new stained glass—it’s great. Only it didn’t cost three million.

CLARKSON:  What do you mean it wasn’t three million?

WHITMAN:  Mitch Davis, he runs Apex Construction, the guys who did the job. I talked to him two weeks ago, just after they finished it up. He told me the whole thing was quoted at two point three.

Clarkson furrows his brow in confusion.

WHITMAN (cont’d): That means Flick would have had seven hundred thousand dollars left over. Seven hundred thousand dollars of Ken’s money that just went poof!

CLARKSON:  So what, you think Flick’s got it?

WHITMAN:  He has to. He’s the only one that had it in the first place.

CLARKSON:  But Ken’s gotta know how much the job was. You think a guy like that drops three mil’ and doesn’t check his receipt?

WHITMAN:  You can grease a lot of palms and pad a lot of pockets with seven hundred grand. Fifty-K to Mitch, a new car for the accountant’s kid, and boom, you’ve got an invoice for three million dollars and the books to match. Walkin’ away with six hundred grand isn’t a bad pay-day for a man of the cloth.

CLARKSON:  So, say he does have it. What do we do, just tell him he’s gotta take care of Delagardelle or Ken hears about it.

WHITMAN:  Not Ken. Katrina.

Clarkson raises his eyebrows.