Lewis Thread (so far...just looking for opinions...)

Klingon Hamlet

I woke up and peeled myself out of my flat and into my telesales job like every other shlub in this generic blue world except that day, that special day, something weird happened. SomethingS weird. See I’m no popular person. In fact I tend to melt into the background like a painting you can’t take down cos your mom bought it for you so you just place it conveniently behind that fast-growing weed plant and marvel at its invisibility. I do this intentionally cos the only person who hates me more than God is me.

Oh, that was melodramatic. I’m trying to be funny here? Like a bomb, that one.


(Anyway.)


So my heels are dragging and my eyes are sagging and cubicle after cubicle blurs by as I stumble towards my plastic prison. Faces turn. I don’t notice at first because the eyes aren’t made to acknowledge what they can’t accept.


Faces.


Turning.


Now I’m noticing. I’m perturbed. Is my hair on backwards? I check to make sure my odger isn’t flapping in the wind like some fleshy banner proclaiming my inadequacies. All fine up top and down below.


Then what?


“Hi...hello...”


Voices bouncing off my face like rocks. Gentle, affectionate rocks. The young interns are looking me up and down and smiling, their ridiculous curves thrown in my general direction and erection. It’s lovely medicine and it’s making me straighten up and puff out the chest and suddenly I’m forty going on twenty five. Especially in my pants.


Someone’s in my seat.


Funny how the most miniscule of transgressions can crack a man’s glee. A lumpy oaf is hunched over my phone reaming off the company shpiel to some poor unsuspecting victim of modern materialistic addiction like a preacher preying on a person’s core, injecting fear and need into their withered hearts. He was doing it with all the charisma of a melting turd. Another ego boost there, cos I knew I rocked at my job.


It’s all I had.


“Hey,” I mutter half-heartedly.


His fat head’s turned away from me so I can only see the flesh shifting over his skull in rhythmic beat to his robotic incantations. It’s a little hypnotising. I break my trance and say a little louder:


“Hey!”


The monotone drone is unaware of my leering over him. Can’t he sense my indignation? All my paranoid anxieties creep up and steal my lunch money as this half-human ape continues to infest my comfortable work-life area. Maybe he’s deaf? Yes, that would make sense in a telesales role. Of course!

Faces.


Everyone’s on their feet watching this little non-event take place. Can’t help noticing the perfect eyelashes and juicy red lips all aimed at me, seeking me out, hunting me down. It’s terrifying and electrifying. What is going on? My fellow jobbers are now like my own personal fans. I’m a movie star and they’re...the paparazzi. Acting like friends til I fall on my face or lose that precious home video and then they’re feeding off my pain.


Damn. They just want to see me miserable. I drop the shoulders. I’m Quasimodo, and that damned big churchbell is clanging away in front of me, and pretty soon I’m going to hammer it with my foot.


Click! Phoneline disconnected. I’m standing over the Neanderthal with the phone cord waving in my hand and a cheeky-boy grin on my face. A-ha! my smirk subconsciously states. And so the massive head rolls on its axis and two puffed-up eyes roll up to meet mine and suddenly I’m beholden to a quivering mass of man and tears:


“Oh Mr Lewis I’m sorry I didn’t see you standing there if I had’ve I’d’ve ended the call immediately I’m sorry...”


And he raises his hands as if to fend off attack or else perhaps to offer them up as sacrifice, penance for his horrendous crime against nature. I’m extremely disturbed. What power do I wield? A god among workmen. My aura reduces mortals to putty. Women seem to want to eat me. It’s be fantastic if it didn’t feel like one stretched-out dream.


I smile.


“It’s OK bub”---did I just say bub? Jesus too many Wolverine comics, dude—“I just want my seat.”


Maybe it was the way I said it. There was a ripple of murmurs around the crowd that had now collected to witness this most mediocre of morning incidents. Had I just blasphemed? Lord knows the government won’t allow that. I half-expected etiquette enforcers to storm in and tazer me. Thou shalt not Want, sucker!

The poor feller (because yes I was reigning in my inner jerk) was opening and closing his mouth like a fish but in slow motion. Sweat was visibly amassing on his furrowed brow. He looked from me to the disconnected phone to the seat beneath his now no-doubt sweaty rump to the lines of viewers just dying to know what was going to happen next! I glanced at them. Their expectant gazes cried, “Fight fight!” We’re in the schoolyard again only this time I’m the bully.


I feel bad.


He stood up too quickly and stammered, “Er, yes sir, your seat, here you go, your seat sir...”


Sir?!?!

“Mr Lewis!” a voice cried, commanding and silky in all the wrong ways. Years of subservience trigger the usual emotional and physiological response: my shoulders touch my ears, my chin tips off my chest, my IBS says Hiii! and my palms become ice cold juddering sponges of sweat. I swivel on my half-numb feet and face Mr Winchurch...

(That's it so far, just curious to see what people think, I've posted alot ofthreads in this section so maybe I'll reign that in a little!)

pickarooney

I really liked it. I was actually annoyed when it ended. Excellent pacing and suspense. A few minor typos in there and a slight mixture of dialects (todger, schlub, flat, mom - where is the narrator supposed to be from?).

Klingon Hamlet

pickarooney wrote: »

I really liked it. I was actually annoyed when it ended. Excellent pacing and suspense. A few minor typos in there and a slight mixture of dialects (todger, schlub, flat, mom - where is the narrator supposed to be from?).

Without sounding pretentious, that's intentional