Blogfest... a bit late

Wow, I'm really, really sorry I worried you folks. I've been in Colorado and just got back last night. I returned to find emails and notes of being missed. I'll admit, it does make me feel all warm and fuzzy inside that people notice when I'm not visiting*stalking*their blogs or posting on mine. I've got A LOT of catching up to do on blogs.

I thought I'd be back sooner than I was so I had signed up for Roni's blogfest http://fictiongroupie.blogspot.com/2010/04/lets-talk-blogfest.html

It's a bit late, but here ya go. This is a scene before the one I posted for the Last Line Blogfest a couple of weeks ago. To set the scene a bit, Sam has been riding with a very religious truck driver and is at a truck stop in Limon, CO. He is back from the grave and in a radically different body with special powers he is still learning about and headed west because he has vague dreams that tell him to go where there's mountains. This is the scene where Sam and Scarlett meet. The reason they 'recognize' each other is because they are both unnaturally pale with long white hair and red eyes and their clothes are the same, except different colors (in case that part confuses anyone).

Rated PM for Potty Mouth:

The windows to my left piqued my curiosity once more, and I paused to browse pewter dragons and authentic Native American dream catchers made in China. Beyond the shelves I could see customers, and when my eyes fell on one in particular, my heart nearly leapt from my chest like an alien spawn on crack.

She looked down at a display of scorpions under glass. Her pale hair was separated into two tightly done braids that rested on her chest. She wore an ensemble of red, and chose to roll up the sleeves of her red poncho to near her elbow. Her eye shadow and lipstick were bright red against her pale skin.

Like a trod upon mouse, my nose squeaked against the glass I'd pressed up against, and her head snapped up in surprise. When our eyes met, I saw her irises were as red as mine. Lined thickly in that black junk girls wore, her eyes went wide when they focused on me. I wasn't sure if it was alarm or joy as she gaped at me.

Granted, I was pressed against the glass as unapologetically as any kid at a shark aquarium. At least the kind of kid that likes sharks a lot. Ones scared of sharks wouldn't have looked as eager as I no doubt did.

The spell was broken when she turned away and ran towards the door. Not sure if she was running away from me or towards me, I stepped back from the glass to wait and see which direction she headed when she got into the long corridor. I was mildly relieved when she approached me. It would have been embarrassing to have to chase her down in the parking lot.

She spoke first. A lot.

"You're like me, right? You look it. Dead, too?" She leaned in close and sniffed. "You look it, and kind of smell like it, too. What are you driving? You're driving, yeah? Going where I am, I bet. You have the dreams? Of course you do, or you wouldn't be here. Brown, huh? I got red, obviously. Thank God. I'd look horrid in brown. Not that you do. Well, you don't look fabulous or anything, but not bad."

"Did you actually…I dunno… want me to give answers here?"

"Huh? Oh, um, sure. I guess. I mean, I already figured it out for myself, except what you're driving."

"I'm not." I was curious how she was able to drive, but she already annoyed me and I wasn't sure I wanted to talk to her anymore. The only thing that kept my feet planted was the fact we were obviously connected somehow, and it was more linear than the Kevin Bacon Factor.

"You're what, then? Hitchhiking? That's dangerous, you know."

"Yeah, well lately I sort of feel invulnerable."

She smiled in a way that made me very uncomfortable. In a flash, she twirled a butterfly knife in her hand then stabbed me in the chest.

"Ow!" I hissed, turning towards the wall to yank it out before someone came along and saw. "You trying to kill… okay. I'll stop there, but OW! What the hell did you do that for? You tore my clothes."

She rolled her eyes, her hand open and expectant of her knife's return. "If you're going to be such an infant, you can stab me back if you like."

I was tempted. Won't lie.

I slapped the open blade into her palm and said, "I'm not being an infant. I just think your flare for the dramatic is out of place in broad daylight where anyone can see us."

"Scarlett."

"O'Hara."

"No, Scarlett's my name, dipshit."

"You're being pretty antagonistic to someone you just met, don't you think?"

"No different than I treat anyone. You're not so special I'll change my ways."

"I don't think you're… stable. Have a nice death." I walked away from her. Actually, I think I scurried like a rat away from her, but I don't want to split hairs.

To be honest, I was incredibly disappointed. She was the first person I'd met that was like me, and she was a lunatic. Normal people didn't go around stabbing others for fun. Seriously, it was random and illogical. Not to mention the fact it hurt like hell.

"Wait!"

I really didn't want to, but I stopped.

"I'm… I'll try to be less… whatever," she said to my back.

"Whatever?" I said, turning around to face her. "Less stabby? Less insulting? I'd prefer both, to be honest. If it's too much to ask, piss off."

"Well, wherever we're going, I've got a car and you don't," she countered. "Want a lift?"

Decisions, decisions… ride with holy-roller, truck-driving stutterer from Deliverance, or with Tank Girl on amphetamines. It was an easier choice than I'd anticipated.

"I guess. Just don't stab me anymore. I don't have any other clothes."

"Cool, come on."

I looked around for Bill and wondered if I should tell him where I'd gone off to. I didn't want him to worry about me. I didn't see him, and I felt bad for disappearing on him, but I was sure the girl was a piece of the puzzle to my new life and didn't want her to leave without me.

Okay, I sort of did. I was conflicted. She was crazy.

Scarlett approached a car, and I prayed she was just pausing to mock it. Unfortunately, she unlocked it and got in. It was a white, two-door Pinto station wagon at least two decades older than I used to be. If that wasn't enough to rate a negative score on the Cool-O-Meter, it was also adorned in stickers from bumper to bumper along the bottom and sported purple flames on the hood.

"Whoever you stole this from probably thanks you," I said as I slid into the passenger's seat. The backseat was missing, leaving a large cargo area.

"Don't insult Martha. She's sensitive."

I snorted. "Martha? You're shitting me."

"My brother named her. She was his for years. Gave her to me when I got my license. Gave her back to me when I zombied. He's got Gerda now. She's a Gremlin, his favorite."

I made a mental note that Scarlett's entire family was unbalanced.

"I was lucky to get her," Scarlett said. "Hitchhiking is dangerous. You're brave for doing it. There's a lot of nuts out there."

She would know.

"No, bravery is travelling cross-country in this thing," I said. "Cross-street is even a risk."

"Get out and walk, if you like."

"Nah, I gotta be there when I'm right. I get the opportunity so rarely, you know."

"So, what's your name?"

"Sam."

"We're introduced now," she said as she held out her hand to shake.

I took it in mine politely, then the freakiest thing yet happened. I saw Scarlett for who she really was. Her hair was black and cut in a short bob, but other than that she was about the same, only shorter. Her complexion was pale, and her dark makeup was in place around her eyes, but her eye shadow was a rich purple. Her eyes went wide, and I knew she saw me, too.

"So, you're a short, dark dork and not really an ivory god, huh?" she said.

"I could say the same about you."

"If you wanted to walk."

"Which I don't."

"Then shut up."

Last Line Blogfest

For Lilah's Last Line Blogfest http://lilahpierce.blogspot.com/2010/04/my-first-blogfest.html,
I submit the last several *coughdozencough* lines of chapter 4 of my WIP.

To set the scene a bit so you know WTF is going on, My MC Sam and Scarlett are both returned from the grave. They've already discovered their bodies reform themselves if damage is done to them. They've just met this day and are still strangers, and are also seventeen. They are being 'called' west, but they don't know where to. They are in her crappy white Pinto station wagon in Denver at the moment, after having travelled across Kansas. They are leaving Denny's at the moment, trying to decide where to head from there.

Oh, and he thinks she's a lunatic.

------------------------------------------------

I left the waitress a buck-fifty, which was over twenty-percent of our seven dollar meal. Quite generous, I thought. As we walked back to the car, I glanced at the nearby interstate and the cars speeding down it. In them were people who knew where they were going. I envied them.

A thunderous sound startled me, and I snapped around in search of its source. Scarlett, too, searched the darkness from her side of the car.

"What the hell was that?" she said.

"Fuck if I know."

We looked around a moment longer, then it resounded again so loudly I covered my ears. Other patrons of the restaurant passed us by with curious eyes, unfazed by the resonating echo in the night. It seemed they were either deaf or had not heard it because only Scarlett and I could. When it struck a third time, a flash of light accompanied it from the sky, turning night into day. My lifted eyes saw dancing circles of color against the clouds.

"A sign?" Scarlett asked across the hood of the car.

"I guess. Words spelled out would be a lot more helpful, though."

"Text message of the gods?" Her tone was amused.

"Hey, divinity shouldn't have limitations."

The lights stopped dancing. I almost apologized to the sky for my disrespect. Maybe the divine disliked being mocked as much as any human.

"Way to go. You pissed them off," Scarlett said. "Say you're sorry."

"You're not serious," I said. True, I'd the impulse to retract my statement, but I wasn't actually going to speak to floating colors above my head.

"Yes, I am. Do it, or don't get back in the car."

"Fine."

"Like you mean it, too. Not one of those fake forced apologies your mom makes you give your brother."

I didn't have a brother, or a sister for that matter. I knew that wasn't the point, though, so I looked up at the lights and said, "Sorry if I pissed you off."

"Sam!"

Scolded by the crazy chick. My afterdeath had reached an all new low point.

"I'm sorry if my remark was offensive to you in any way," I said to the luminescent colors, feeling like a world class jackass.

The lights circled again, then drifted away slowly, heading south.

"Get in!" Scarlett said, throwing open her door. "They're going to show us the way!"

That was a pretty wild assumption, I thought, but I did as I was told. For all we knew, the lights were going to lead us off a cliff. Or to a used car dealership.

Scarlett peeled out of the parking lot and sped down the street. I wasn't sure her Pinto could take that kind of abuse, but negative remarks about her car while she was excitedly speeding down the street seemed a bad idea. It was harder to keep my mouth shut when we nearly caught air going over train tracks.

"Dead or not, you need to obey the rules of the road before you send other people to the grave," I said, gripping the door handle in anxiety.

"You know what?"

A rhetorical question I loathed. I almost answered sardonically, but kept it to myself.

"Shut up," she said. "I'm not going to kill anyone. You don't count. You're already dead."

"Well, I'd prefer not to be dismembered again, thanks."

She shot me a confused glance, then her eyes returned to the road.

"Watch out for the...!"

"I see it."

The Pinto narrowly missed someone edging their Mustang out from a gas station parking lot. They honked loudly and the driver gave us the finger.

"Being with you is almost more excitement than I can handle," I said.

"Yeah, I get that a lot."

First Page Blogfest

In Potterverse, I'm a Slytherin, hands down. I also used to RP more often than I drew breath, so I've got a zillion of these little beauties to thrust at you. In the meantime, I decided to partake of the First Page Blogfest, my very first participation in one. Mostly because it required no effort on my part. I already had this stuff written, after all. ;-)

Blogfest is here: http://kellylyman.blogspot.com/2010/03/in-beginning.html

------------------------------------------------

And here's my first 24 lines:


My life did not begin until I experienced death, and the irony does not escape me.

Travis Makowski was my name before I died. Now I’m just Sam. No reason, really. I didn’t name myself after a movie star or my favorite pet from childhood. It’s a simple, average name, one that’s easy to remember. Sometimes I still turn my head when I hear someone say my old first name, but for the most part I remember my new name.

Not hatched from an egg or conjured from a cauldron, I had parents before I died. Like a lot of kids, I had more than two. I suppose they are out there still, continuing on as they always did; watching television, shopping at the local super store, trudging through the menial and unrewarding jobs they bitched about so much at dinner.

I never blamed them for not wanting more than they had. Sure, they wanted to win the lottery and retire, but they never tried to see past the next horizon. They were good people, but boring and small-minded, and I knew I’d never want to be like them. I wanted to get out of school and get the hell out of Iowa as soon as possible.

Wish granted, I guess.

I wanted more out of life than a crappy job, more than to just get by and have enough for beer and the occasional visit to the Shrine of the Next Pop Culture Movement, a.k.a. the Cineplex of Doom.

Okay, I added the ‘of Doom’ part. I just can’t shake the feeling those flashing neon lights are the eulogy for independent thought disguised as entertainment. Then again, most of my ideas have no bearing in reality.

Except my idea of death. I’m pretty sure I’m dead.

I was never sure if someone listened when I prayed. To avoid talking to myself like a crazy person, I usually avoided prayer, but gazed upwards on occasion and gave an apologetic smile just in case.