diary of a dead muse by benjamin goshko sentientsurfer

Diary of a Dead Muse By Benjamin Goshko (SentientSurfer) Copyright 2011 Benjamin Goshko Smashwords Edition Monday Lindsey`s feather-weight Netbook is sitting on the table in front of me. Its coffee spattered keys can`t handle my frenetic typing. Every now and then a fingernail slips under one and nearly pops it off on the upstroke. It`s sunny today. Very humid too. When I open the patio door it feels like I`ve stepped into the shower. My cat curls up on my toes. An oval of warm fur. There`s something wrong with his sinuses. Ever since we found him as a kitten, he`s wheezed like an old man. Nothing is coming to me today. I stare at a nearly blank screen. All I have is a title -Diary of a Muse - and a mental image of its protagonist. Twil. Twil looks like a fairy when I picture her. Buttermilk skin, sparkling green eyes, mischievous dimples next to an almost sinister, thin-lipped smile. She`s an overeducated, selfish, immature brat. Anytime I use her in a story, my otherwise loyal readers come to despise her. She wasn`t supposed to be pretty. I never wanted her to be, but can`t help but add features to her that make her more alluring. Maybe it`s so she continues to hold my interest. I never tire of picturing her. I`ve given her every hair and eye color. The bleach white backdrop of MS Word crushes my creativity, and I can`t muster another keystroke. I close the Netbook, walk out, onto the patio, and light up a cigarette. Tuesday Work is brutal today. Clients needlessly harass me via text message. My boss is taking a case to trial on Friday and is in his usual last-minute panic. He asks me to compose memos I`d already written several months ago. I stack the old work on his desk as I go out to lunch, and he`s impressed by my assumed efficiency. I take an extra hour of break time to work on my writing. Twil haunts me. She`s very playful today. She blows me a kiss. Her story still eludes me, so I insert her, under a different name, into a short piece of fan fiction. The story`s been posted on a forum for less than an hour when I get my first comment. My dozen or so readers enjoy it. "Good imagery." "Love it - write something longer." I smile while reading the compliments, but am annoyed that Twil hasn`t earned me a single dollar or been formally published. When I get home, I swear to myself that I`m going to do her justice. I go back to the Netbook for brainstorming, plot sketching, etc. Hunger soon overwhelms everything else, so I make dinner before Lindsey gets home. Salmon with Dijon mustard. My favorite. Lindsey arrives and flicks on the TV to watch a talent competition. I slip into the bedroom with the Netbook, but the sound of amateurs mangling classics from my childhood carries through the door, and I can`t focus. Wednesday A mall is just across the street from my office. I often go there for lunch. The food makes me feel sick one out of every three times I eat there. I choose carefully to avoid stomach cramps, and settle on a chicken teriyaki bento box. Most of the time, the food court is filled with pregnant mothers and office workers. Today, it`s clogged with teenagers. It might be from an early dismissal day at the local Highschool. I work an hour from home, so I don`t know the name of it. One of the teens is wearing a burgundy jacket. She reminds me of Twil, even though Twil is about ten years older. For a moment, I consider inserting Twil into some angsty Highschool romance novel. She could have a crush on a football player - or better yet - a misunderstood outcast. But that would ruin her character. She`s supposed to be immature for her age. That`s what draws me to her. After dinner, I spend a little while online, researching women`s clothes and makeup. I want to know what Twil might wear and how she`d do herself up. I delete my browsing history. If Lindsey sees it, she`ll think I`m cross-dressing. Late that night I dream about Twil. We`re on the beach, cuddling. She`s in a tight pink bikini. I reach back and pinch her butt. I wake up and hear the cat snoring from somewhere under the bed. Lindsey`s stolen the blanket and I`m aroused and covered in goose bumps. I feel as though I`ve just cheated on her. Thursday My writing group is tonight. We meet at a pizzeria near my office every other Thursday. The pizza there is terrible. The dough is always burned and grease beads up on the cheese to the point where it`s nauseating. The group leader raves about it though. I suspect it`s because she`s married to the owner. I drink a beer before the meeting starts. It helps calm the nerves of being critiqued in person. I`d submitted a short story. No one else had. Too shy perhaps, or just uninspired. The suggestions pour out as soon as we begin. Everyone says they liked the piece at first, and then they proceed to nitpick word choices and minor grammatical quibbles. The eldest member of the group, John, has been turned down by agents hundreds of times, so he naturally likens himself an expert on `craft` and getting published. He talks incessantly about guns - which ones he owns and what model of automatic rifle he fired once, down in Kentucky. John didn`t bother to read my piece before the meeting, so he skims it while the others critique it, and then proceeds to tell me that while I write well, I need to work on `craft.` He asks why he should care about my protagonist - another thinly veiled iteration of Twil. He doesn`t empathize with her. He doesn`t like her. He rattles off examples of characters he does like from movies and old literature. Some of the other group members rise to my defense. Others take a snippet of his critique and then go off on a tangent about their own rejections by various publishers. I conclude that John and Twil wouldn`t get along. She would eat him alive. There`s nothing she finds funnier than insecure machoism cloaked in arrogance. As I drive home, I think about a new story idea that would really wow my group, including John. I don`t know why I care, since I don`t value John`s opinion, yet I feel personally insulted that he doesn`t like Twil. She`s the perfect woman. Friday It`s trial day, which means I get to sleep in late, but need to wear a suit to court. Annoyingly, I`m forced to wait in line to go through the metal detector like the hoi polloi. The girl ahead of me has a poem tattooed onto the back of her neck. I try to read the cursive letters, but she keeps cocking her head back and forth while yammering on a cell phone. Our client is in a holding cell in the court basement. I have never seen him before. The bars on his holding cell look like chicken wire and darken him into a shadow. There are other men in the cell with him, but he sticks out, as he`s wearing a grey suit and black wingtips. Incongruous considering his surroundings. My boss doesn`t want me sitting second chair for `tactical` reasons. I take a place in the back of the courtroom and watch the slow, laborious process of jury selection. My mind wanders back to the beach. Back to Twil. She has a high pitched giggle that sounds like a harajuku schoolgirl. On her bottom lip is a sticker. A shiny gold star. I don`t know why it`s there, even though I put it there, but it makes her look like a rock star. I melt. During lunch recess, I go to a bar just down the street. A fellow attorney told me that my favorite bartender quit, so I`m stuck with a surly redhead who looks visibly annoyed when I order a club soda. Twil would make a good bartender. She`s a good flirt and a night owl, but might be too scatterbrained to hold down a steady job. The idea of her working at a beach bar, and getting fired for her forgetfulness, seems like a good concept for a story. I jot it down on the back of my business card. When I get home, I write the chapter where she`s fired. She cries in front of her boss. I reread it, and it makes me sad. I hastily decide the idea`s not going anywhere and delete the chapter from the hard drive. Saturday All of my friends want to tour a brewery today. They`ve been bugging me about it for months. I like beer, but could care less how it`s made. I insist that someone else drive to the brewery so I can get sloshed on free samples. The car ride feels like a reverie. The weather is perfect. I daydream about Twil, dropping her into plot concepts I`ve seen on TV and in movies. Lindsey holds my hand and tries to snuggle, but I pull away so I can stay focused. A group of people exit the brewery as we arrive. We`re just in time for the next tour. It takes less than fifteen minutes. Our tour guide looks inebriated. He slurs his words. The bottling area smells rank. I stick my head into an empty mash turn and picture being trapped in it. After five free samples, I`m sufficiently buzzed. We stop at a restaurant on the way home, but I don`t talk to anyone. I`m still thinking about Twil and where she belongs. I put her in a horror setting and smile as I sadistically torture her. To make up for the pain, I take her shopping in Japan. She looks stunning painted up like a geisha. That night, Lindsey accuses me of cheating on her. She says I`ve been ignoring her for weeks. I deny everything and explain that I`ve been trying to come up with an idea for a book. She doesn`t believe me. I promise to take her out on a `date` tomorrow. She agrees on the condition that I put aside my writing for a while and focus on her. I lie and agree. Sunday I lay awake for most of the night, sneaking in only a few hours of sleep before morning. During my insomnia, I try and picture Twil, but she doesn`t come to me. I`m too tired to picture anything. I ruminate on my promise to Lindsey. The thought of giving up on Twil infuriates me. She`s been in my head for five years, longer than I`ve been with Lindsey. I think it`s ridiculous that Lindsey is jealous of a figment of my imagination. ... - tailieumienphi.vn