David - Opening excerpt from my novella for WOW - let's talk

Happy weekend to all,

I trust the writing practice is going well. Shutting out other distractions, choosing a daily writing ritual, and just putting down in rough form whatever is most important in your message to the world.

One of my favorite parts of any story - and perhaps yours too - is the Meet Cute, the screenwriter's term for getting two characters together for the first time. So here is the Meet Cute from the beginning of my new project. You will see the title has changed. There is a fun payoff for that title further in the story, and we'll talk about payoffs here soon. This is such an exciting time in the life of a writer - to eat, breath, sleep and dream the story and see where the characters are going to lead next. I'm right in the thick of it and have more realizations than I've been able to get down. That is why I keep a section in the document called Realizations and make a crude list of all the things I know to be true about these people and this story. I now have 14,000 words and a pretty good idea where we're headed. I am keen to hear how your own stories are shaping up, and how practicing the Way of the Writer is influencing your work and most importantly your life. And any thoughts or questions on the process and projects, send them my way! Commenting here is great so we can all participate. Thank you and please enjoy the story thus far...

Curvas Peligrosas

By David Kilmer

“The course of fate runs strong and straight through most of history. At the beginning of every tragedy, the elements are all in place; they only need time to combine into disaster or chaos or stalemate, or all three. But add good intentions, and fate gets more imaginative.” —Julian Evans

“The best way out is always through.” —Robert Frost

This is a place under the spell of volcanoes. A town where all the houses are painted white, and as you look up the crooked streets, past the shining buildings, there are dark volcanic cones vanishing and looming again in the mists. The air has a slight and perpetual gritted haze, and when you inhale deeply there is something animal about it, like a leviathan’s hoary breath, and you know you are tasting the secret exhalations of the great slumbering giants themselves.

In the tidy town square is a church, also white, and a fine bronze sculpture of the founding father leading a burro. It is long gone to green and the only bronze to be seen is on the burro’s back where many generations of niños have insisted upon riding. Here strong and fragrant coffee is served at the little cafe, coffee freshly brought down from these hills, and the early sun makes the white houses almost impossible to look at. On this particular morning, very much out of place amid the whitewashed plaster and cobblestones, a gleaming hulk of a big twin Harley-Davidson motorcycle ticks as it cools in the mountain air and waits for its rider, who is just now lifting a cup of that superb local coffee to his lips.

Sam Dandy is his name, a name you don’t forget, straight out of a dime store novel, but he’d rather go by anything but that. Dandruff to his closest buddies. Danders to the rest. To the long arm of the Texas justice system, he is known as Samuel H. Paulson Dandy.

His first taste of coffee is both bitter and sweet, and the rough mug fits well into the callused contours of his hand. The coffee is so good in this place it would be sacrilege to cut it, and besides Sam Dandy never puts milk in his joe.

“I like my coffee the way I like my women,” he proclaims to the cup with a twang. After three days alone riding down from the Texas border in a place where he does not know the language, he’s begun a new habit of talking to himself.

The cup does not reply.

“Bitter and murky,” he finishes the joke, and laughs, a low rumble of a laugh not unlike a Shovelhead engine coming to life.

He can feel the miles in his back and his shoulders, in his knees. Been a bit since he rode a bike. Learning again how far he can dare to lean in the corners. Remembering how much it sucks to ride through gravel. And a few close calls. The first day, before he knew any better, driving too late into the dusk, and then the dark, he very nearly came to grief, not from the bandidos he was certain would get him. but from an innocent black cow, standing square in the middle of the highway, quite perfectly camouflaged to the night. At the very last moment he had sensed more than seen its bulk and swerved the bike just in time. One of those close calls where your heart beats faster for a good while afterward. And then you finally know you need to find a place, any place to pull over and sleep. Three days on the road and I’m gonna make it home tonight . . He was far from home, but these days he didn’t have much of a home, either.

At the opposing angle of the square, a woman leans against the wall. On this chilly morning she’s found the one patch of sun. Sam Dandy looks at her, and she looks at him. He lifts his coffee cup in greeting. She looks away.

In this mountain town with its white walls, he feels he is truly coming awake for the first time in a long while. The strip malls and freeways and billboards of a few days ago are only a vague disturbing dream. This place is so pretty it’s damn near a postcard or a movie set. The hero sits at a table in the town square. Birds fly up in the early light. There are bright flags above him casting long triangular shadows. The breakfast waiter wears marvelous mustaches and is classically attired with a white shirt and skinny black tie. He serves with a flourish, turning the ordinary table into one fit for a distinguished visitor. The Harley is the only thing out of place. Well, and him. Nothing much moving at this hour; even the village dogs are still sprawled out cold. Just the man and the woman, facing each other across the square.

She’s trying not to stare his way. Men so quickly seem to get the wrong ideas. But he’s interesting to look at, a distraction from the rest of her rather troubling thoughts. Boots, leather chaps, a leather jacket. A red bandana around his sunburned neck. His hair cut close to the skull. His legs are stretched out in front of him, and he’s rubbing at them.

A dog trots over and plops itself at his feet. A slim female, white like the town, with ears like a fox and intelligent eyes. Good looking dog. See, he looks over at the woman and says with his eyes, Hey, I’m a good guy. Dogs like me. She gives him the half smile and the nod that maybe he deserves after all. A sense of playfulness is her weakness when it comes to men. Make me laugh, she always says, make me snort out my nose. The rest is pretty simple.

The sun shifts by degrees. Nothing else changes. The coffee in the cup slowly diminishes and then is replaced by the ever-watchful waiter. The woman moves along the wall so she stays in the sunny spot. Without provocation or any signal that he can see, his dog jumps up and leaves him, trotting across the square to nuzzle the woman, and to sit by her side.

What? He pantomimes. What did I do?

Her smile encourages him, and he stands up. With a sweep of the hand and a tilt of his head he beckons her to join his table. As if it is the grandest table in the world, his gesture says. She smiles again and shakes her head.

He pretends to ignore her for a while. He watches another street dog come limping along, with that busted up front leg on an otherwise healthy animal that is a sure sign of an unrepentant pursuer of cars. “Here buddy,” he says and makes a smooching sound. The dog limps straight to him and flops down with a world-weary sigh, and Dandy can see he has one ear torn off and only one remaining testicle.

The rider gestures to the woman in triumph. Look, see my dog. But now she is ignoring him. This standoff continues, and it feels that it might continue until the sun slants all the way across the square and goes away again into the cool mountains, until the volcanoes shift and rumble and fill the air with fire, so pure is the moment, so still the morning, so unreal the light, these bold original brushstrokes, all white and pale blue with only a few extra dabs from the rest of the palette; red and green flags, brown riding leathers, the woman’s black jeans and the midnight blue motorcycle, the greyish blue of the volcanoes. At long last their two dogs, as if by some signal, arise from their slumbers, meet precisely in the center of the square, go sniffing round and round, and then without too much more foreplay they go straight into the carnal act, humping like there’s no tomorrow, and right in front of the church, too.

Now she’s got her hand up to her face, and she’s laughing hard enough that he can hear her across the square, and to his lonely ears that laughter is the very best part of the entire scene, flung unscripted from the back of her throat, a laugh light and free, jazz music, an exotic bird’s call, the summons of an intoxicating goddess and he a beguiled mortal washed up on this strange enchanted isle.

Now she sees him hiking himself out of the seat, walking across the square with an amused glance toward the dogs still coupling happily and without shame. Dios mío, he’s headed her way. He’s walking a little stiffly. Probably a little more riding than he bargained for. Another gringo on an adventure, about to find out how big and distant a place Mexico really can be.

He hears the echo of his boots and feels like he’s walking into gunfight. The residents no doubt are watching from safe hidden places to see who fires the first shot.

“Howdy ma'am,” he says.

His accent right out of the Westerns. He even tips an imaginary hat.

She looks him over pretty good. His eyes are squinty and his face is red with a little stubble. His lips are chapped. His nose, when he stands there in front of her, even in the extra height of his boots, is right about even with hers.

“Our dogs really like each other,” he says.

The imperialistic assumption that everyone speaks your language. She regards him with a direct gaze, with a slight frown. He retreats and reloads.

“You… want some coffee? Café?”

“Ah… gracias,” she says.

After all, she is a Mexicana who understands the harshness of the word no. You don’t hear the word much in her gentle and genteel country, and you don’t speak it like that to street vendors or even to blunt and blundering motorcyclistas who are passing through town and chatting up the girls.

He misunderstands, and grins, and welcomes her toward his table with his outstretched hand.

Dios mío, a girl could get used to that grin. Not so much to love about his face until he smiles, and then, ayyyy papi. A grin that she bets has gotten him away with all kinds of things. Beckoning her to coffee as if he’s just invented it for the first time, like he just picked it and brewed it himself, the kind of enthusiasm that makes an ordinary man something more. Most men were so serious about everything. This sunburned cowboy on his steel horse has the kind of smile you could take home to mama. It’s a grin she imagines would be mighty nice to wake up to. Cuidado, chica. Cuidado!

She shakes her head and points up to the icon of a bus painted on the wall. He pantomimes great disappointment, going into a whole act, placing his face in his hands and mock sobbing a little. And then he squares his shoulders, blows a breath out bravely and squeezes his eyes shut. It’s the look of a man trying to remember his Spanish. To her it looks like he’s preparing to face the firing squad. She watches his lips, the words trying to form there. He’s almost got it . . .

BONGGGGG.

He jumps and looks wildly around, and this is no act. She can see he’s truly startled out of his wits, poor man.

BONG. BONG. BONGGG.

The square is suddenly so filled with the brassy exuberance of the bell there is no room for thought or endearing Spanish words. A small man is making a big sound, pulling a rope to the bell, counting out the cadence and taking his job seriously. The bell is not that large but holy smokes it can sure make a racket. Finally it stops.

Ah no, he’s trying again. Slow and hesitant he proceeds. Encouragingly, expectantly she gazes, her mouth trying to help him make the words.

“Perdon. Senorita. Mi. Nombre. Es…”

BONG. The bell erupts again and the sound is hurled against the walls and back again and there are bells everywhere. BONG. BONG. BONG. BONG. BONG. BONNNNG.

He gives up and just shakes his head, and she tries her very best to memorize that grin.

“Malinche,” she says, “Mal-in-che” and then watches his mouth try to say her given name, which does not come easy.

“Che,” she says.

“Che.” Puts his hand on his heart. “I. Am. Danders.”

“Danders?” It’s her turn to be tongue twisted. “How about Harley?” She points to the bike.

He likes the way it sounds when she says it.

“You bet,” he says. “You call me Harley. Hell, you call me whatever you want.”

So here’s Harley and Che, newly named, far from known, eye to eye in a far-off place, the attraction so instinctual, the meeting so unexpected that there is no time to question any of it, the shadows of the flags, the slumbering volcanos, the resonant bells. She sees that his eyes, under the squinted brows and past the burned and stubbled cheeks, are a faraway blue like her beloved Pacific Ocean. And in her eyes he sees greens and golds, and God help him, they are the eyes of his children, the eyes of his future. Just like that.

Now cue the music, make it faint at first and then swelling louder, a Latin chanting from the open doors of the church. It’s a sacred song, strictly speaking, but to look into someone’s eyes for the first time and hear those ancient Gregorian harmonies hurled from the reverent lungs of priests into the mountain air is an unforgettable delight. To the both of them, it sounds pretty damn romantic all right.

This spell can only be broken by one thing, and that is the arrival of her bus. Dandy instinctively hates it as soon as he hears it, an intruder, an eloper, come to kidnap this fine senorita and her blazing gold eyes and steal her far away. And here it comes, lurching, belching, squealing and making itself known in all the multi-symphonic ways a Mexican bus will do. A school bus no doubt, long ago and far away in quite another life up north, it is still very much going strong, dozens of different paint jobs and three engines later. This bus has probably outlived most of its drivers by now. It would be difficult, Dandy thinks wryly, to get run over by a bus like this, nearly impossible, because you could hear it coming from miles away.

He feels a powerful urge to take her hand, to pull her with him and not let her out of his sight. Who’s the kidnapper now? Instead he puts his hand up in farewell, like a man taking a solemn pledge. She takes that unspoken pledge by putting up her own hand, and then she brings her hand against his, a tender act, the palms of their hands it turns out remarkably suited for each other, hot and cool, rough and smooth.

“Harley?”

“Che!”

She picks up a small backpack and climbs into the bus, which begins to move. He wills it to break down, right there. How could a machine last this long on these streets? It takes its time around the square, grinding and huffing, and all the while through the window he sees her face, a face that seems suddenly so familiar, like a reoccuring dream, and he sees she has her palm up against the window so he raises his. And then, just before she turns the corner, she does something that surprises them both. She blows him a kiss through the scratched and broken window. And then she’s gone.

And now it’s just Sam Dandy, aching in his bones from the ride and aching in his heart from her sudden appearance and then departure. He stands there morosely in the square, feeling sad in a way that is hard to explain. It’s the feeling after a concussion when there’s a sour taste in your mouth and things do not seem quite the same. The priests sound off key. The light is harsh. The dogs have finished their business and gone their separate ways again. And now here comes the boy dog, limping past him, and Dandy would swear that dog looks back over his shoulder and winks at him. Three legs, one ear and just one nut, the dog is saying, and I still got more game than you.