Chapter 2

When we get home I carry Thomas to the front door where my wife is standing, gripping a small plastic bag with what I assume are maxi-pad tampons. Shes clicking her heels on the concrete and as I get to the door I look through the window and notice that the television is on.

“Hurry up I have to pee, Steve.”

“Hold on honey, just give me a second.” I shove my hands into my pockets looking for my keys and find the jagged metal and pull them out and the receipt from the smoke shop falls to the ground right next to my wife's shoe. She doesn't notice and I open the door and we walk into the warm house. The first thing I see is the Christmas tree and I set Thomas on the couch next to it, his favorite spot in the house. 

“Andrea did you leave the TV on?”

I hear a reply from behind the closed bathroom door, but I cant make out what she says. The fire place made the house too hot and I take my jacket off. I look at Thomas on the couch and get a warm, sensation of love in my chest, just the feeling of total overwhelming adoration. The television is on and I look directly at it for the first time and notice that its a porno. The clicks of Andrea's heels are coming down the stairs and I scramble to find the remote and I cant find it anywhere and shes nearing the room and I'm looking under the f*****g couch cushions and the remote has vanished. The matronly clicks of my wife's heels cease to echo and Andrea stands at the front of the living room.

“What the f**k are you doing?”

“I'm trying to find the damn remote before Thomas sees this. Soon he'll be saying, 'Mommy, mommy! Put on Bondage Babes!', instead of f*****g Sesame Street.”

“That's not funny, Steve.”

“Yeah I, know.” I gave up on the remote and walked to the television and turned the power off. Andrea gave me a cynical look, like as if she thinks that I was watching the porn for my own indulgence. What a b***h.

Andrea walked into the kitchen and I followed her. She went to the fridge and opened it and said behind the giant door,  “I forgot to get orange juice, goddammit.”

I was pouring myself glass of wine, a five year old Cabernet Sauvignon. When she said this I laughed and drank some of the wine. The small window above the sink was frosted over from the snow and the dull glow shined through. I walked past Andrea to the window, gently pushing her hips out of the way while she was being consumed by her divine iPhone. I pressed my nose against the window and realized that the car door was still ajar. 

“Honey will you go to the store and get some orange juice for me please?”

I lean back from the window and stare at the condensation plastered to the glass. “Sure, what kind?”

“I don't care.”

“Alright, I'll be back.”

I walked out of the room when the ceaseless ticking of texts being sent drowned out the room. Outside the night was cool and I listened to the crickets strumming their legs like instruments. The door to the back seat of the car was open and I walked over to it and grabbed the bong and shut the door.

I leaned against the car and called Lucas on my cellphone. I gazed in through the window into the house at Andrea talking on her phone. Seven rings and I hung up. Goddammit.

The front door opens and the light falls onto the door mat and Andrea's feet appear. I open the car door in haste as she calls my name, an annoying, nasally plea.

“Steven, someone called for you, I don't know who it is.” She shut the door slowly and resumed talking on her cellphone that was cradled in her neck and shoulder.

“Okay,” 

I walk inside the house and the cold goes away. The phone is on a small bureau by the window, the receiver cradled crookedly so as to not end the call. I pick up the phone and place it against my ear. I can hear distorted heavy metal music in the background and I know exactly who it is. 

“Lucas, is that you?”

“Steven, hows it going man?”

“Pretty good how about yourself?” I try to sound annoyed.

“Uhmm, really, really, like, like as if the thunder shocked my car and hit right on the engine and just f*****g blew it up, that's how I feel.”

“What?”

“Steven, you called me right?”

“Yeah I did, why didn't you just call me back on my cellphone?”

“Uhmm, well my cell phone died, so I called your home phone number on my home phone.”

“Why?”

“ 'Cause they listen to cell phone calls. They don't even bother to break into the landlines anymore. They stopped that when the f*****g iPhone came out man. Did you know every conversation that's held through an iPhone with both parties gets recorded and listened to by the government because in two thousand and, s**t what was it, eight, I think, yeah two thousand and eight, Apple released like five million iPhones in the Middle East for like...oh no it's two thousand and nine.”

“Lucas, shut up.”

“What?”

“What happened to your car? Is it immobile?”

“What are you talking about Mr. Greene?”

“Goddammit Lucas, you just said your car was hit by lightning!”

“I was talking about a movie man.”

“Look, where are you?

“In my car.”

“I thought you said you called me from your home phone?”

“I did.”

“But you're in your car.”

“Indeed, sir, you would be correct in your very formal assumption.”

“Lucas, just drive over to Simpson Street. On the corner like last time.”

“Yeah man sure I'm almost there.”

“Great.”

“Yeah man that movie I saw was--”

I hung up the phone and looked at Thomas laying on the couch asleep, his face a warm glow of red and green Christmas tree lights. I grabbed a blanket and covered him with it before going back outside.

Reviews

[Alleyway Rover]

First let me say I dug the hell out of your voice and the general weirdness of this piece. The juxtaposition of the idyllic family house with the man putting his sleeping child by the Christmas tree with the roaring fireplace and turning to see a porn mysteriously playing on the TV was gold.

‘“I'm trying to find the damn remote before Thomas sees this. Soon he'll be saying, 'Mommy, mommy! Put on Bondage Babes!', instead of f*****g Sesame Street.”’
Yes, this a legitimate fear for any parent, especially in this day and age. Also, funny as hell.

I liked Lucas’s paranoid rant about the government listening to phone calls (although perhaps not so paranoid given the state of affairs in this country).

Where I think this piece fell short was in conflict. I couldn’t get a sense of what your main character, Steve was trying to do or what was stopping him from doing that. I noted some tension between him and his wife, but no real conflict the feels like it can drive a story. It’s not always easy to tell what the primary conflict of a novel is from one chapter, especially a chapter kinda out of context, but even in this one scene I didn’t get a sense of what Steve was trying to accomplish and whether or not he succeeded in that goal.

Your characters drive the story and conflict is it’s engine. Without that conflict… well the story doesn’t really go anywhere. Three things to think about when it comes to characters and conflict, be it over the course of an entire novel or in one individual scene, is what the characters motivation is (what he or she wants), what their goal is (what, specifically, do they need to accomplish to satisfy their motivation) and what stands in the way of that goal.

The other thing I noticed was the abrupt change in tense. You start this chapter in present tense, “When we get home I carry Thomas to the front door where my wife is standing, gripping a small plastic bag with what I assume are maxi-pad tampons.”

And suddenly we are in past tense: ‘“Yeah I, know.” I gave up on the remote and walked to the television and turned the power off.’

I hope this give you some ideas as you move forward with this piece.

[Chadvonswan]

Thank you very much for the well-written, thorough commentary, I appreciate you taking the time to read, and write a 'critique' for my chapter!