Your assignment, should you choose to accept, is to give me your critique of Chapter 2 from We the Enemy, a novel of mine that I categorize as "speculative suspense." Reader comments were extremely helpful in tightening Chapter 1. I believe this chapter is more polished, but you be the judge.
The chapter, a short one, is below. If you have not read Chapter 1, or wish to refresh yourself, you can read it here.
Truly, I appreciate your insights and comments. It's good to learn what works for readers, and what does not. Next week I'll be critiquing some new samples sent in, but I hope this will be interesting until then. Here goes...
Chapter 2
“Yet another vicious Road Tag tragedy strikes the streets of Illinois.” The words from the television gain a hollow echo as they bounce off the naked walls of Jake Black’s studio apartment.
His picture window, blinded by the night, portrays a black void where Lake Michigan sloshes far below. Nearby high rises and ant trails of car lights on Lake Shore Drive add random glitter. The view costs extra, but it’s a waste; nothing much touches him these days.
Clothes litter the floor; they’ll stay there until he runs out of clean stuff, then he’ll bundle them into a pillowcase and take them to the laundry room in the basement. Tidying for guests isn’t a problem because he never has them. No place to sit, for one thing. He keeps things lean: one phone, one TV, one TV tray, one lamp, one table, one chair, one computer, one dresser, one nightstand, one bed.
On his bed, sprawled on his back stripped down to t-shirt and shorts, head propped up on pillows, he drains his wine glass and reaches for the bottle on the nightstand. On the TV at the foot of his bed, the Channel Five prime-time newsie—an unctuous specimen named Bruce Ball—continues his report against a backdrop of a body being lifted onto a gurney. The newsie says to the camera, “Even children are not safe from the deadly game of Road Tag.”
Cut—the picture changes to a shot of the victim, a pimple-faced boy, his unblinking eyes staring, his life spilled from a deep gash on his forehead. A paramedic glares at the camera and yanks a sheet up to cover the dead face.
The newsie’s voice continues, “This victim is just fourteen.”
Jake tips the wine bottle over his glass. One lousy drop dribbles out. Too numb to care, he lets the bottle slide from his hand to thud on the floor as he gazes at the television.
Cut—an amateur videotape replaces the ambulance scene. It shows a Chevy sedan stopped at a red light. An old woman with a cane, her frizzy white hair escaping from a knit hat, hobbles across the crosswalk. The newsie’s voiceover says, “This home vid, confiscated by police when they caught the notorious Lombard tagger, catches the game in action.”
The traffic signal goes to green and, like a dragster coming off the line, the car charges and clips the woman, knocks her cane high in the air, and sends her spinning.
Jake mutters, “Sick bastard.”
The newsie’s voice drones, “Road Tag started in Peoria, but has now spread through the Midwest, and tagger reports are on the increase in the East.”
On the screen, the old woman tumbles to a stop against the curb and lies on her back, her arms and legs flailing like a belly-up turtle. The newsie says, “There are rules in this macabre game, though. You can’t go until the light turns green, and no score if you kill your target.”
Cut—the newsie turns to watch paramedics slide the gurney into an ambulance and close the doors. He says, “Tonight it’s tagger zero, pedestrian zero.” He turns back to the camera, broadcasting just a hint of a smirk that says aren’t I clever?
Jake mutters, “Another sick bastard.” He clicks the remote and banishes Bruce Ball to nothingness, where he belongs. Drowsy and anesthetized from his wine—hey, you don’t feel, you can’t hurt—Jake drifts…
As though he rides a magic carpet, Jake floats down a sidewalk toward an elegant old brownstone in Chicago’s Near North side, where Yuppie money has transformed old working-class neighborhoods into laps of luxury. Afternoon sun dapples its front with the shade of trees lining the street. The building appeals to him. The front door opens magically, and he sails in.
A muffled, high-pitched noise comes from upstairs. It sounds like a child. He likes children, so he orders his magic carpet to carry him up.
On a second-floor landing, the sound comes again from a doorway to his left. He drifts through it and enters a bedroom.
Watercolors of delicate flowers grace a room furnished with oak and lace. Toys and stuffed animals clutter the carpet in playful disarray. Blocks and dolls and picture books suggest a child of five or six. But no one is there.
He drifts to an open window and discovers a fire escape. Anxiety shadows his mood. The bright day dims. He thinks himself through the window.
A dizzying look down finds nothing below. The roof is one flight up. He rises.
On the roof he discovers a beautiful young woman and a lovely little girl. Like the young woman, the little girl has big brown eyes, long brown hair, and olive skin.
Jake loves the young woman and the little girl.
But the little girl’s eyes are wide with terror. Her mouth opens, and the muffled noise comes out. Her face tells him it’s a scream. She screams because the woman holds her out over the low parapet around the roof.
The woman laughs and swings the child back and forth, her laughter as muted as the little girl’s scream.
Words come from Jake, but he can’t make them out because they are muddled and slow, as though made of molasses.
The woman frowns at him. She pulls the child in and says slow-moving words that he can’t understand. Her face is angry. Wild.
His hands rise before him; they grip a pistol. He aims at the woman.
She swings the child high into the air, laughs, and turns toward the parapet.
He pulls the trigger.
The bullet strikes the woman below her ribs. Its force staggers her.
Her eyes train on him. With great deliberation, she throws the screaming child over the roof’s edge.
He pulls the trigger a second time.
Again she staggers. Then she dives after the child, her muffled laughter falling away.
He hears a strident buzzing. The blue of sky dissolves into the beige of his walls, and his alarm clock yells at him.
Jake gropes and turns off the alarm, then realizes that he holds his breath, his jaws clenched and aching. Bright sunlight glares through his window. He sighs and lies still for a long moment, confused and hurt, but he doesn’t know why.
His gaze drifts to a small photo in a plain black frame on his nightstand—his daughter Amy in her favorite, flowery party dress. He reaches and touches a tiny silver crucifix hanging on its chain from a corner of the picture frame. Amy wears it in the picture, forever five years old. The crucifix glitters, and then he can’t look at it any more.
God, his head hurts. It’s a struggle to get up and shuffle into the bathroom. Red, puffy eyes stare at him from the medicine-cabinet mirror. He wonders about the moisture beneath his eyes. He touches it with a fingertip, then tastes. Salty. More and more, he finds it there when he wakes.
Then he pours a few ibuprofen tablets into his palm and turns to readying himself for his appointment with the Attorney General of the United States. As he lathers his face, he debates whether to wear a suit or not. Wearing a suit sucks—but he’s meeting Marion Smith-Taylor in a luxury hotel…
Thanks in advance for your help.
RR
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© 2005 Ray Rhamey
It is a very interesting chapter and much easier to follow than the first.
I'm having a hard time with the present tense writing, that may take awhile to get used to.
In describing his apartment...the "one" was very redundant.
You know Jake better than I do, but he doesn't seem like the wine drinking kind of guy. Jack and coke, Budweiser maybe...but not wine.
I like the idea of the road tag on the news, but they would never show what you described. If you're going for real, that is way too graphic. They wouldn't show the dead kid or the grandma flying through the air.
“This home vid, confiscated by police when they caught the notorious Lombard tagger, catches the game in action.” Would sound more like a newscaster if it said: The home video that was confiscated by police when the Lombard tagger was arrested shows in graphic detail how the game is played."
The dream is lucid, so I can't say too much about how it flows. Dreams are crazy anyway!
Posted by: Michelle Pendergrass | June 04, 2005 at 07:05 PM
Hmmm, seems like this site is getting spammed all to heck...
Posted by: Gumption Brash | May 19, 2010 at 08:27 AM