eddie and roger

by nick nelson

back in my old home town there was this place called bill’s fixit store. it had a sign outside that said “we fix anything”. i t was understood to mean that “anything” referred to things that a customer could bring in and leave at the store, not submarines or nuclear reactors. it was also understood that “fix” meant that bill would give it his best shot at fixing whatever, but there were no guarantees or warranties. it was that kind of place - what you might call a vestige of a vanished age. bill did not come into the store much, and did most of his fixing work in the basement of his house half a mile away. on summer days bill would leave the basement windows open and passersby could hear his radio blasting old 1950’s pop hits into the warm air. sometimes old mrs jones, who liked to sit on her porch across the street, would complain to bill about the music, but bill just ignored her and kept on playing his tunes as loud as he liked. bill had two guys working for him at the store, eddie and roger. eddie worked in the front, dealing with customers, and roger in the back, taking care of the paperwork and accounts, and also doing some of the simplest fixit work. neither eddie or roger could afford a place of their own on what bill paid them. eddie lived with his old grandfather, and roger with his mother and older sister. eddie spent most of his pay at chuck’s bar. he was not a heavy drinker, but nursed his drinks trying to pick up women - at which occupation, by his account, he was a great success. he also bought a little weed, and sometimes bet on football games. roger gave half of his pay to his mother for his room and board and the other half went to one thing - the lottery. eddie thought that roger’s putting half of his earnings into the lottery was hilarious, and let roger know it. eddie was the kind of person who said the same things over and over, and when things were slow at the store, he would ride roger endlessly about two things - roger’s lack of interest in women and roger’s chances of winning the lottery. “you don’t know what you are missing, man. you should get out, live a little, while you can, instead of waiting to win the lottery when you’re ninety years old and your dick is all shriveled up. i can introduce you to some of the ladies at chuck’s - i mean, they’re dogs, but you might like them.” and so forth and so on. eddie had a sister named edie. she would sometimes come into the store and give eddie news about their parents, who were divorced from each other and both now living with new partners in florida. edie was divorced herself, and therefore, in eddie’s mind, must be desperately looking for a new husband. a running joke of eddie’s was that edie and roger should get married. he thought this was the funniest idea in the history of the world, and kept returning to it. things went on in this way, with eddie trying to pick up women, roger playing the lottery, and edie occasionally dropping into the store, when one day the unthinkable happened. roger won the lottery! he didn’t win “the” lottery, the “big game” worth hundreds of millions of dollars, but he won a smaller prize of three million dollars. roger seemed to take it in stride - as if he had expected it all along - but eddie was astounded. in his mind, three million dollars was the same as three hundred billion dollars - infinite wealth. but if eddie was amazed at roger’s winning the money, he was completely flabbergasted by what roger did with it. almost nothing! roger bought himself and his mother snd sister a new, bigger house, put the rest of the money in a savings account, and kept coming to work at bill’s! eddie began to seriously plot the proposed marriage of roger and edie. he assumed that when this took place, he, eddie, would then have access to roger’s bottomless ocean of cash. when edie and roger both laughed at him, eddie became enraged. one night, slightly drunk, he went from chuck’s bar over to edie’s apartment. edie was entertaining her new boy friend, pete, and when eddie started up again about edie marrying roger, pete was not amused. “come on, man, a joke is a joke the first time, but this is getting old. why don’t you go home and stop bothering people?” the conversation heated up, and eddie punched pete in the mouth. pete happened to have a gun in the pocket of his coat, which was hanging in edie’s closet. he went and got it and shot and killed eddie. represented by a public defender, pete was sentenced to life in prison, with the possibility of parole in twenty-five years. bill decided he no longer needed two people in the store, as he could now do himself on his laptop many of the things roger had been doing on paper for years. roger continued working at the fixit store by himself, attending to customers as eddie had done previously. the years went by. roger’s mother died, and roger married an old friend of hers, from the local church, a woman twenty-three years older than himself. bill retired, closed the store, and moved to arizona.

the damned

by nick nelson

phil didn’t like your report on mrs miller. he wants you to go see her again. what? what was wrong with it? he didn’t say. he just told me to tell you to go see her again. but i saw her. but there is nothing else to say about her. take it up with phil. this is so unfair. i see you don’t want to take it up with phil. what about the report i did on mister wilson? he didn’t say anything about it. not to me anyway. so it must have been o k. i couldn’t really say. ask phil. but mrs miller and mr wilson are practically one and the same. take it up with phil. what was wrong with my report on mrs miller? it was the same as my report on mr wilson and they are exactly the same. they are identical twin clones. i guess he didn’t think the report on mrs miller was good enough. but i’m just guessing. good enough? what’s good enough? who gets to decide what’s good enough? phil. what difference does it make if something is good enough as long as you do it? some people thinks it makes a difference. some people are wrong. the only thing that matters is if you do something, and get it done. not if some mope with nothing to do all day except criticize other people thinks it isn’t good enough. i’m just the messenger. you can go see mrs miller again or not. or talk to phil. it’s up to you. the only thing that matters is getting something done. what are you two bozos jabbering about? come on, it’s lunch time.

to have it or not have it

by nick nelson

the most beautiful woman in the world was waiting for the richest man in the world to show up in his long black limousine. finally, as the sun was rising over the tallest buildings in the world in the largest city in the world, he arrived. i am sorry i am late, the man, whom we will call rm-1, said, as the limousine pulled away from the curb. it would usually then head for an elaborately furnished cabin beside the most sparkling lake in the world, in the greenest forest in the world. the woman, whom we will call bw-1, answered politely, i am sure you had a good reason, as she settled into the back seat of the limousine. i had a very good reason, rm-1 replied. too good a reason, i am afraid. and what is that supposed to mean? look here, do you mind if we cancelled our little rendezvous? i am afraid i am in no mood for it. that is up to you, bw-1 answered. though i must say it is not like you. something came up at the meeting this morning. the meeting? what meeting was that? oh, just the regular monthly meeting of those of us who run the world - i should say, those of us who are seen as running the world. and what did you who run the world have to say for yourselves this morning? it was not what we had to say, it was what was said to us - told to us, by - by the real rulers of the world. bw-1 looked out the window. she realized they were not heading for the city limits, but were driving in a circle around the block. so what happened next? bw-1 asked. rm-1 took a deep breath. to get right to the point, starting next week the world is going to be shut down. oh? what does that mean? it means that the people - the entities - the creatures, whatever you want to call them, who have been ruling the earth for millions of years, have decided to take what they want from it, and then blow it up. blow it up! that does not sound very helpful. but what is it that they are going to take? and where? where? i couldn’t really say. some other planet, i guess, or some other dimension. are they taking any people? some people, yes, apparently. bw-1 relaxed. well then, we should be all right. i mean, i am the most beautiful woman in the world and you are the richest man in the world, so if they don’t take us, who are they going to take? well, you see, they don’t really care about things like that. they have their own priorities. oh? the only thing they care about is yp-9. that’s our name for it, we don’t really know what they call it, or if they call anything anything. and what is yp-9? this is like breaking rocks, bw-1 thought, but kept her tone polite. we don’t know, rm-1 sighed. we have had our best detectives, like mr holmes, and our best scientists, like professor newton, on the case, but all we know is that some humans, and some other animals or plants, have it, but most don’t. some humans have it, some monkeys that live in eritrea, some kind of moths in the hills in pakistan, i can’t think of the others. and you don’t know which humans have it? no, just that you either have it or you don’t. bw-1 fell silent. after a while she said, and then they are going to blow up the world? yes, or the solar system, or the universe or whatever, i am not too clear on that. they have something , have always had something, in the center of the earth, they just push a button and there you go. it doesn’t seen fair. no, it doesn’t. after all the hard work i put in, getting where i am. i feel the same way, rm-1 said. the limo stopped. they were back where they had started. i will let you off here, rm-1 told bw-1. i have a few things i want to clear up. bw-1 put her hand on the door. and all this is going to happen when? starting next tuesday, probably. well, good luck. good luck to you, too. bw-1 got out of the limo and it sped away. the sun was shining, it was a beautiful day. people flowed over the streets like fish in a tank. she took out her phone. she decided to call rm-2, the second richest man in the world, and hear what he had to say.

waycross

by nick nelson

a man with a scar on the left side of his face walked up to a boarding house in waycross wyoming , kicking up dust as he went, and rang the doorbell just as the sun was going down. the boarding house was painted brown. you don’t see too many brown painted houses any more. the man waited patiently. finally a woman with her gray hair in a bun answered the door. “hello, mrs wilcox.” the man said. “my name isn’t mrs wilcox,” the woman said. “not mrs wilcox?” the man replied pleasantly. “then who might you be?” “do you want to rent a room, mister? this is a boarding house and i can rent you a room, even though my name isn’t mrs wilcox.” “what kind of pies do you bake?” the man asked. “i don’t bake no pies - they ain’t worth the trouble. i can give you a decent breakfast though.” “don’t bake no pies! in a boarding house, yet! i knew the world was in trouble, but i didn’t know it was in this much trouble.” “do you want to rent a room, mister? i ain’t got all night to stand here.” “do you know what happened to mrs wilcox?” “i never heard of her. you must have the wrong place, or the wrong town.” “every place is the right place, and every town is the right town, if our hearts are in the right place.” “that’s a beautiful thought. are you selling bibles, or encyclopedias maybe?” “you don’t see too many houses painted brown these days, especially boarding houses.” “it’ a long story, mister, you don’t want to hear it.” “oh, but i do want to hear it, i assure you.” “well, this feller, his name was stevenson, or miller or some name like that, and he offered to paint the house, and supply the paint, for two months board and rent. he didn’t say he only had brown paint.” “that’s an amazing story. it just goes to show how you never know how things will work out.” “i am glad you found it so. now, if you will excuse me, i got some mending to do - “ “wait, i haven’t told you what i wanted to see mrs wilcox about.” “is it any business of mine?” “it might be. i had a proposition for her - “ “i ain’t one for propositions, mister, in any way, shape, or form. now, if you will -“ “wait! wait!” the man with the scar on the left side of his face stuck his foot in the door. “it as about building a new jerusalem, a new jerusalem, right here in waycross, that people from all over the world will flock to -“ “a new jerusalem? new babylon more likely. we don’t truck with such nonsense here. take those apples to st louis or chicago, not here in waycross.” “that will change the face of the earth -“ “i don’t think so.” “and the way the human race lives - like it says in the bible - and in the teachings of the ancient mystics - “ “if you scrape the paint on my door, mister, i will call the sheriff.” * the man with the scar on the left side of his face trudged down the dusty road with a slight limp. what could you expect, he thought, from a woman with no name who didn’t even bake pies? * a man with a patch over his right eye approached a boarding house in wendell idaho just as the sun was coming up. he heard a rooster crow, and sat down on a tree stump by the side of the road to wait for signs of life in the house. the house was painted pink, and had a wide window ledge, suitable, he thought, for placing pies on.

david and george

by nick nelson

david oliver miller was waiting for the bus. he had recently been downgraded at his place of employment and no longer had a license for a private vehicle. he had noticed another man, outwardly similar to himself, who also took the same bus every morning. this man always remained on the bus when david got off it, presumably because his place of employment was further down the road. david was bored waiting for the bus every morning. he wondered if the other fellow was as bored as himself, and felt an impulse to ask him. but, even though he had been humiliated and downgraded, he was still sufficiently grounded in society’s ways not to enter on such an unseemly course. the months went by, and nineteen days out of every twenty, david and the other man waited for the bus, got on it, and travelled to their respective stops. one day the other man was not there, and david never saw him again. and after a few days, never wondered about him again. the other man’s name was george holiday lloyd. he was an accredited citizen-informer, and enjoyed reporting on his fellow citizens’ lapses, large and small. he had often wished that david would speak to him, so that he might discover something about david, which he, george, could then report to the authorities. it should be noted that citizen-informers were trained never to arouse their prey’s suspicions by initiating contact. but david never did, and that was that. there are many stories that happen, and many more that do not happen.

ursula and jeffrey

by nick nelson

ursula entered the room. she reached for the light and switched it on. oh! jeffrey! she exclaimed . you startled me. jeffrey turned in his amchair and regarded ursula with the baleful gaze she had come to know so well. startled you, my dear? surely after all these years you must have come to know that i often sit brooding the dark? yes, of course, ursula replied a bit testily, but even after all this time, i can not get used to it. really? and why do you think that is? jeffrey sneered.. are you asking me why i can not get used to it? what part of my question did you not understand? do you really want to know why i can not get used to your sitting in the dark? i have told you that i do. very well, then, i will tell you. please do. it is because i hate you! jeffrey laughed. is that all? well, my dear, it may interest you to know that i am not all that fond of you either. do go on, please. this is interesting. and of course so entirely unexpected. so you wish to know why i am no longer fond of you? if you care to tell me, please do! it is because i am in love with another. ha ha! and the fortunate creature who arouses this longing in your dessicated soul - does she return your ardor? she professes to, jeffrey replied stiffly. ha ha! professes to! then i leave you to her. jeffrey leapt out of his chair. what! am i to being given to understand that you are granting me my freedom? that is exactly what i am giving you to understand, as you put it in your typically pompous and overstated way, well, i , i, i thank you. may i ask why, after all these years, you are choosing to act in this manner. ursula laughed. i see that you have not heard the news. news? what news? why don’t you turn on the television and find out? and with a last triumphant look, ursula stalked out of the room. what could this momentous news be? still in something of a daze, jeffrey decided to pour himself a drink before following ursula’s advice and turning on the television. jeffrey never watched television, except for an occasional opera or symphony on the public broadcasting channel. he went to the liquor cabinet and poured himself a stiff whiskey. the next thing he knew he was sitting in his armchair and light was streaming through the french windows. had he dreamed the whole thing? no, there was the empty whiskey glass beside him. and no sign of ursula, or the butler, or any of the maids, any of whom should have awakened him. he got up and turned on the television set. the screen was completely blank and silent. jeffrey went to the window and looked out. what he saw astonished him. what appeared to be some sort of army, or at least a large group of men in black uniforms, was marching down the street toward his building. a large man in a white uniform rode in front of them, on a white horse. were they some sort of marching band? no, they were neither playing nor carrying instruments. nor, so far as jeffrey could see, were they carrying any sort of weapons. jeffrey descended the four stories to the street. the house was strangely silent, as if ursula and all the servants had fled. when jeffrey got to the street, the marchers had stopped in front of the house. the man on the white horse turned to jeffrey. are you mister jeffrey jefferson? the man asked. his eyes were hidden under the bill of his white uniform cap. yes i am. i have a message for you. indeed? and what might that message be? that you can shave off your silly little mustache, because you are no longer what you used to be.

the particular item

by nick nelson

william was two thirds of the way to the store, when he remembered that he had forgotten something. what could it have been? it must have been important or he would not have remembered that he had forgotten it. he turned back, even though he knew that he was wasting precious time, and that the store might not have the items he wanted, when he returned. there was no one in the lobby, when he returned to his building, and no one on the elevator when he took it up to his apartment on the twenty-second floor. but there was a man standing outside his apartment. the man wore a brown jacket and a green hat. excuse me, the man said to william, but have you lost your wife? no, william replied, i do not have a wife. well then, have you lost your dog? i do not have a dog either, william said. then you must have lost your cat. no, william said, i do not have a cat. the man in the brown jacket shook his head. i am sorry to hear that you do not have a wife, a dog , or a cat, he said. perhaps you would like to obtain one of those things? not this morning, william said. now if you will excuse me, i am in a bit of a hurry. certainly, the man replied. i did not mean to intrude. perhaps we may meet again some time, and i may be of more assistance to you. perhaps, william agreed. the man departed, and william entered his apartment. as soon as he did, he remembered what he had forgotten, because they were lying on his little kitchen table. they were applications to change his name from william to walter, and to move to an apartment on the nineteenth floor. how could he have forgotten them? he picked them up. he would drop them off at the superintendent’s office on his return from the store. he hastily retraced his steps to the store. when he finally got there, it had most of the items he wanted, but not the one he had particularly wanted.