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| Author: |
Edmond Caldwell interviews himself |
5 comments
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Q: How many rejections does your first novel have now?
A: I stopped counting at twenty.
Q: What is the main reason given by editors for the rejections?
A: They find the hero unsympathetic.
Q: Is the hero unsympathetic?
A: He’s a sociopath, you tell me.
Q: Why are you so angry at capitalism?
A: It looked at me funny.
Q: If you could be buried alive with a famous person, who would it be?
A: You my sweet!
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| Submission Date: |
| 16 Dec 2007 |
Category: |
Short story
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In Podcast and Chap-book
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good deeds
I had just completed a run and was walking the rest of the way home. It was a cool, showery morning, and even though I had worn a cap with a visor, the lenses of my glasses were misted over with fine droplets of rainwater and fogged from the heat of my face. My sweatshirt was damp with the rain and the t-shirt underneath with sweat, so wiping the lenses was clearly out of the question. Lifting and lowering my chin to peer under or over the rims, I tried to decide if I could see better with or without them. I took them off and cradled them in my fingers, squinting for a few blocks until I came to the intersection I had to cross, where I put them back on. The glasses were still wet and as soon as they settled on my nose they fogged up again.
There was a crosswalk at this intersection but no stop-light. Traffic was not especially heavy, but two young girls stood at the curb ahead of me, paused as if afraid to venture into the painted lines or perhaps heeding remembered words of caution from a parent. I couldn’t tell too clearly through the wet befogged lenses but the girls appeared ethnic, with long straight black hair and brown skin. I assumed they were sisters, an older and a younger sister – or at least a taller and a shorter – and the hands of the taller sister rested on the handle of what looked like a baby carriage. I couldn’t see if there was an infant in the carriage or not – maybe the carriage was a toy and there was a doll inside or even a pet – but it was obvious that the smaller sister was too large to have been its possible occupant now toddling alongside on foot. The girls were wearing long pastel-colored dresses instead of more typical attire such as jeans; there was something – especially with that baby carriage – old fashioned if not foreign about them.
There was a sign in the meridian reminding drivers that it was the law to stop for pedestrians in the crosswalk, yet the two girls looked like they might be waiting for the moment when simply no cars at all were visible as far as the vanishing points up and down the street. This chance to cross would be gone before long, so I stepped out ahead of the girls and held up my right hand, palm out, towards an SUV hissing along the wet asphalt about fifty yards away. I also lifted my left hand, fingers spread slightly, towards the girls, as if indicating for the driver the reason for my stop gesture or as an invitation to the girls to enter safely the arrangement of parallel and diagonal white lines demarcating the crossing. In any case my gestures produced the desired results – the oncoming vehicle slowed in plenty of time and the sisters undertook finally to cross the street. The older or at least taller one pushed the possibly-empty baby carriage before her and the younger or shorter one rested her hand on the carriage’s edge, in lieu perhaps of being able to clasp her companion’s hand for the crossing. One of the girls said thank you as they moved behind me but I gave only a slight nod and a hum of acknowledgement in response – I was keeping my eye on that SUV and a more distant blue car which had appeared further back in the lane next to it.
I caught up to the sisters as they stepped onto the concrete island of the meridian. The wheelchair-access dip allowed the taller sister to push the carriage onto the island without too much jostling. Plenty of cars were approaching the intersection from the opposite direction, but I now felt firmly in charge of the girls. Whether they had attached themselves to me or I had adopted them, we had become a temporary unit. I let some of the nearest cars pass and when a gap opened up before the next wave I stepped out. This time I felt far less tentative about thrusting forward my hand, palm out, at the oncoming cars. The cars in the first lane slowed and the girls followed me into the street, but it looked like the foremost car in the further lane was going to speed right through the crosswalk even though it was impossible at that point that its driver did not see us. With an appearance of affront I gave my extended arm an extra push – as if pumping a symbolic brake pedal, perhaps – and halfway through the intersection the car finally stopped. There were two lanes of stopped cars now so our procession had an audience as we made our way at last to the safety of the far curb. Here the sisters and I parted company, the girls pushing their delicate carriage down the side street while I continued up the main road in the direction of the apartment-block where I had recently rented a basement studio. The sisters didn’t thank me again and I offered only a parting wave myself, which the girls appeared not to see. Our unit had dissolved. The cars on my left resumed their journeys, whizzing past me on the wet asphalt.
Looking at the blurs of the cars through my misted-over lenses made me wonder if it had been unsafe for me to have elected to ferry the girls over the crosswalk. I didn’t think so, but their safety had not been my chief concern anyway. The children had been a pretext to stop traffic, I realized. Whether on foot or driving a car – back when I could afford my own car – I always felt excessively vulnerable on the streets. I couldn’t go out without feeling jostled, particularly by other males; in fact I was so sensitive to real or imagined jostling that I could even feel jostled by a male passing on the opposite side of the street if he happened to be walking in a strutting or assertive manner. I imagined that the drivers I had made to stop had been males, even though I hadn’t actually seen them. For a brief moment I had dominated them and their cars.
By the time I went down the steps to my apartment I was imagining that the drivers might even have taken me for an off-duty police officer. The cap with the visor was blue, and I wore blue sweatpants and a grey sweatshirt. My gestures had felt authoritative and I’d inhabited them as if I had been a quite different person. As I unlocked the door I remembered the surge of power and pleasure. But this made me feel uneasy now, because I hated the police as much as I feared them. I had been in town only a few days and hadn’t yet registered with the police, which I was required to do by the terms of my probation. Days later, while waiting at the station, it occurred to me that of course the baby carriage had been a toy.
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Marlene's comments
Edmond, love this piece.
I want more. Says Marlene.
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28 May 2008
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Cecile's comments
Ah, Edmond, now I am haunted by young girls wearing old fashioned frocks crossing streets even though I have no need to dominate men. Or do I? Really, I love this piece!
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26 Jan 2008
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Schlomie's comments
A subterranean note that would leave a smirk on Doestoyevsky's face.
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17 Dec 2007
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Jenna's comments
Amazing that I could feel so nervous waiting for two girls to cross the street! That's tension for you. Publishers, wake up!
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17 Dec 2007
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randy's comments
great to find such a brilliant piece! This author is bound for glory.
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17 Dec 2007
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