Homeward Train Ride Short Fiction #1

31 August 2010
A Sexy Shade of Platinum
By Noah Buck
Marcie waited with mounting impatience. She sat alone in the brightly lit room; fluorescent lights making the white walls seem icy and unsympathetic. “One would think a doctor’s office should try to seem at least a little comforting,” she thought to herself. She was not accustomed to counting on other people for anything…especially anything having to do with her health.
She shuffled restlessly where she sat on the edge of the medical bed, her movement causing the tissue paper covering the dense cushion to crumple like crushed autumn leaves.
A moment later the door swung open and Dr. Bloomfield walked in with his gaze glued to the clipboard in his wrinkled hands. “Well,” he said with a sudden smile as he looked up at Marcie, “if it isn’t my favorite supermodel!”
“Hey Dad,” Marcie sighed. She hated when he used his silly nicknames. While she knew he meant them to cheer her but they somehow always seemed to have an inverse effect. Once, when she experienced a late onset of chicken pox during her Junior year of high school, he had called her his favorite leopard-print daughter. She stayed in her room for three days out of sheer embarrassment.
“So,” he continued, chipper as ever, “what’ll it be today?”
“I’d like to change my hair color.”
“I don’t know why. It seems to be a perfectly healthy shade to me!”
“You’re missing the point, Dad! I’m done with brown and that means my cheeks need some serious work!” Marcie took a tone of absolute seriousness which, had anyone other than her father encountered, they’d have thought her utterly crazy.
But lucky for both of them, Marcie and her father were equally ridiculous.
“Alright Pumpkin, you seem to have gotten yourself all worked up and I think a little lipo will do just the trick to calm you down and bring out that gorgeous smile of yours.”
Marcie cooled visibly, her expression now matching the austere white walls. Meanwhile, the doctor set down his clipboard and picked up a small red marker, uncapping and brandishing the implement as a painter might hold a delicate brush. Squaring himself opposite his daughter, he thoughtfully squinted his eyes, tilted his head from one side to the other, then began sketching in small red triangles just beneath Marcie’s strong cheekbones.
“Have you spoken to your agent recently?” he asked her without breaking his stony concentration.
“Felipe and I had lunch this afternoon,” she replied through tightly held lips. She didn’t want him to smidge the lines.
“And what did he say about auditions this week?” the doctor asked, stepping back a moment to review his handiwork.
“He said he thinks I’ll get a lot more call backs if I go platinum. Apparently blonde is huge again.”
“I can see that. All those pop stars. Porn actors- is that what they call them? Actors?”
“I don’t have any idea, Dad,” Marcie replied with a flash of frustration, “next I bet you’ll want me to try out for parts in that whole smut industry!”
“Well,” he replied, “I mean you could really make it in that industry. Look at you, you’re perfect for it!”
“Dad!” Marcie cried out, “I can’t believe you’d say such a thing! I’m your DAUGHTER!” Tears welled at the corners of her blue eyes.
“Marce, you know me well enough to know I am not the kind of person to judge. I just want you to be-”
“-successful! You always say that! Never once- I mean, have you ever- there’s plenty of girls whose parents want things for them- GOOD things! And what do you want? Just a trademark. To revel in somebody else’s compliments. ‘That’s my work,’ you’ll say. ‘Her eyes took four different procedures,’ you’ll say. ‘Not one visible scar,’ you’ll say.”
By now Marcie’s tears had begun running profusely, flowing blood red through the ink still on her cheeks.
Her father stood stalk still, the red marker still poised in his hand. His mouth opened then closed, open then closed. Like a fish. No words.
“Well?” Marcie demanded.
Silence.
“Well,” in an instant contrast she calmed. It was as though she’d had a coughing fit and only just managed to catch her breath. Her face went still again. The tears stopped. The red ink still ran a little, pooling just above her chin.
“I- I’m sorry doctor,” she said embarrassedly, “I don’t know what came over me.” Dr. Bloomfield continued to stand.
“I had a brief- there was a lot of wine in the sangria at lunch- we had lobster. Could we pretend that never happened? I’m ready now.”
The doctor stood a moment longer, looking over Marcie like an archaeologist puzzling over a newly unearthed skeleton. Marcie waited. Then, taking a large breath, the doctor sighed and said, “nothing happened. Nothing at all.”
He stepped in towards her face again.
“But now I need to fix all this damage.”

Momentous and Now

In order that the day not pass without note, despite it now being past midnight, I have to write a little something about what's finally come to be.

I got a job.

A real life job.

A Monday to Friday, actual salary, actual title job.

Moving here in January was something I did with a haphazard plan and a bundle of hopes. The plans unraveled, changed, became hybrids of themselves over and over. The hopes were challenged, wilted, nearly died, but somehow maintained just enough root to finally grow into something just now beginning to blossom.

And I couldn't be more grateful.

A friend and I were talking today about the importance of religion as it relates to the way humans go about their daily lives. Belief in something larger, ungraspable even, fuels the notion that the damn near impossible is actually within reach. Days like today remind of the truth in this idea.

Yes, I worked hard and will continue to do so.
Yes, I made my intentions known.
Yes, I refused to give up.

And no, I will not forget the difficulties of the path that led me to where I am right now.
All of the twists, turns, trip ups, and down falls have chipped away the superfluous parts of my person and left a young, soft, ready-to-grow form. The journey I now face includes the ways in which I'll carve a new face out of the battered features still intelligible on that form.
The craftsmanship is paramount.

I will commit to making it the best I've ever done.

The Internship -or- The Joy of Hearing What One Hopes

It began like any other morning on the upper east side: traffic down Lexington steady and innocuous, cotton sunlight fuzzying the facade of the building across the street as its combination of textured surfaces- brick, grout, glass- reflect the morning into our bedroom.

The feeling hovering about the apartment was altogether average. An average display of average things: average coffee, average shower, average two minute process of deciding what to wear.

The average AM ritual was consequently followed by further displays of the average quotidian activities. Average train ride to midtown, average walk, average cattle call trudge through the line for (yet another) coffee.

Culminating in an average kiss goodbye and similar-feeling exchange of "have a great day", the events to that point seemed to indicate nothing out of the ordinary. Neither better nor worse.

Then came the phone call, the new resume, the interviews, the successes, and the sudden novelty of sensing purpose, motion, a future.

Perhaps I'm over-dramatizing the whole situation. Be that as it may, I've yet to feel so elated at a professional accomplishment. In this case glimpsing a plausible light at the end of a dark tunnel filled with menus, wine bottles, cocktails, gluten allergies, high chairs, and special requests.

Sure, it's just an internship. But it's an industry I care about, a path I've longed to walk, a future I've been wanting to build.

No, I'm not counting my proverbial chickens before they're hatched.
I'm just happy. Happy and reveling.

Would that I could charge down this Open Road and see nothing but clear vistas of pathways bright and wide through landscapes lovely and thrilling.

All the while growing back a few of my very own curls.