Please Hold on as Sudden Stops are Some Times necessary
He shot himself in the fiction section, being careful, he thought, not to soil any of the books, including his own.
But a last glance at his name on the spine of that light volume that took place just as his mind raced through his childhood memories caused him to swerve, ever so slightly, splattering and scattering the validated names of several of his fellow writers, now resting on the shelves.
He too was now resting, albeit, on the floor, under cover of several volumes of again, various authors.
His face, blackened slightly from the gunpowder, had that certain look that all newly dead people have a sort of confused look. Especially by those that commit suicide, for it is at that very last tiny particle of infinite and yet oh so finite time that a certain realization comes over them.
For him it was knowing that as he fell back, bullet through the palate, the brain, the skull and then his finely coiffed head of hair, that all his efforts might have been in vain.
He should have just stayed home and placed his thin volume of self-published fame on the nightstand, then laid down and put the bullet to work, but no.
Or he could have ever so casually pulled out his pistol while reading to a crowd and then, think of the fame, he thought. All of them first cowering in fright but then, once he made use of all 9mm of lead, they would gather round, wondering at the power that his book might contain.
But here he was, in the fictions section. He was a writer of fictions after all. And he'd longed to have his name up there straddling the greats, so if being amongst them just meant sitting on a shelf, then that would have to do. This would be his tombstone.
But that look on his face said it all, if one could say anything––that was the look of a man, watching as his last will and testament, his life's work, fell not backwards, to rest upon him with all the others, but instead, fell forward, into the dark abyss behind the shelf, the collector of all volumes too small to stand amongst the greats.
But a last glance at his name on the spine of that light volume that took place just as his mind raced through his childhood memories caused him to swerve, ever so slightly, splattering and scattering the validated names of several of his fellow writers, now resting on the shelves.
He too was now resting, albeit, on the floor, under cover of several volumes of again, various authors.
His face, blackened slightly from the gunpowder, had that certain look that all newly dead people have a sort of confused look. Especially by those that commit suicide, for it is at that very last tiny particle of infinite and yet oh so finite time that a certain realization comes over them.
For him it was knowing that as he fell back, bullet through the palate, the brain, the skull and then his finely coiffed head of hair, that all his efforts might have been in vain.
He should have just stayed home and placed his thin volume of self-published fame on the nightstand, then laid down and put the bullet to work, but no.
Or he could have ever so casually pulled out his pistol while reading to a crowd and then, think of the fame, he thought. All of them first cowering in fright but then, once he made use of all 9mm of lead, they would gather round, wondering at the power that his book might contain.
But here he was, in the fictions section. He was a writer of fictions after all. And he'd longed to have his name up there straddling the greats, so if being amongst them just meant sitting on a shelf, then that would have to do. This would be his tombstone.
But that look on his face said it all, if one could say anything––that was the look of a man, watching as his last will and testament, his life's work, fell not backwards, to rest upon him with all the others, but instead, fell forward, into the dark abyss behind the shelf, the collector of all volumes too small to stand amongst the greats.
posted by Bob Shattuck at 7:49 PM
1 Comments:
this is a wonderful piece of writing.
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