baby - 1. the church and the space ship

by nick nelson

part 1 of ?

women sweep up and wash the dishes. queen alberta could not decide whether to be a man or a woman. the world is divided into two kinds of people. anyone who calls themself a man move back one space. men and women go to church together on sunday. things went on in this way for a million years. men clean and oil their guns and hunt and kill deer and moose. women bake cookies and sometimes brownies. one day a space ship landed on earth. men watch football on television while women sweep up and wash the dishes. dad was a man and mom was a woman. and had been that way for a million years. all was silent after the space ship crashed into the rain forest. that’s not funny. just shut up and sweep up and wash the dishes. make up your mind - you are one or the other. joe king cleaned and oiled his favorite rifle, real slow. he knew what it meant to be a man. the moon floated over the trees, when the time comes, everybody will take their place. you know who you are. esmeralda carefully swept up the cookie crumbs. joe hung the cleaned and oiled rifle on the wall over his bunk. esmeralda finished sweeping up. they could all have used a good laugh just then. all this happened a million years ago the moon shone through the window on the carefully swept floor. to be continued

hey joe

by horace p sternwall

hey joe, where you going with that cactus plant in your hand? i am going to cincinnati to bury my head in the sand i don’t think you are really going to cincinnati at all i think you are going to indianapoiis to shop in its famous mall why do you always torture me, and doubt my every word? you know that i am not one of the common herd i wake up every morning before the break of dawn and before the wide word is astir i get my mojo on i sit all day in jake’s cafe and no one ever looks my way but if they did they might be surprised at the epics unscrolling behind my eyes poor joe, locked in the arms of fleeting time if hopeless dreaming was a crime he would spend a thousand years in alcatraz but carlsbad new mexico is all he has

82325

by hotrace p sternwall

my brain is not what it used to be it used to work more efficiently when i was young and wild and free and wrote poetry beneath a tree i tried to write a happy song but the universe did me wrong and all its blind inhabitants never gave me a fighting chance i had a message for humankind locked within my burning mind but when i let it loose upon the air i realized there was nothing there i am sorry to take up your time with this meandering rhyme i have nothing better to do though i know my heart is true

novel 88 - 25. the road

by nick nelson

part 25 of 25

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night had fallen. joe trudged down the road to the quaintly rustic train station. he carried a paper bag containing the sandwiches and bottles of water the security guard had given him back at the castle. he figured he was about halfway back to the station so he decided to stop and sample the fare. he sat down on a grassy spot beside a bend in the road. as he sat down he felt the letter in his back pocket - the heartfelt handwritten letter he had intended to deliver to sebastian dream. he had asked the security guard if he could leave the letter with him, and the guard had replied - you can leave it, but per my instructions i will just burn it. yes, joe had thought, and have a good laugh reading it before you do. i know your type. so he had kept it. he unwrapped one of the two sandwiches. it seemed to be black forest ham and gouda cheese on a sourdough roll, with some sort of special sauce. it tasted pretty good. joe finished the sandwich and one of the bottles of water. he got up and looked back at the castle, now barely visible beyond the brow of the hill. most of the lights in the castle had gone out, and now a couple more did. just like the lights of my dreams, joe thought. my dreams. and the dreams of all the other chumps and suckers and losers who thought they had a chance. who thought they could catch a break and be given a fair shot at the gold ring - who thought the pay window would stay open after the race was over and the rainbow would never turn gray and there would be a wallet full of greenbacks lying in the gutter of the last street at the edge of town before you hit the desert and the empty sky above the desert would open up and pour down rain just before you died of thirst - yes, he had always believed - always believed. the end

novel 88 - 24. the castle

by nick nelson

part 24 of 25

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the sun was setting as, after a long journey, joe approached the boundary of sebastian dream’s castle in scotland. a security guard appeared from behind a tree. he had a nasty looking weapon of a make joe, who was not a weapons person, could not identify, sling on his shoilder. can i help you? yes, i am a - a correspondent - of mister dream’s. is he expecting you? i did not send him a message telling him i was coming. in that case i can not allow you to proceed. but i know mister dream very well. i have corresponded with him for months. he has helped me out, given me advice. so have thousands of other people. that can not be possible. the guard laughed. mister dream has his ways. suddenly a terrible thought flashed through joe’s mind. does mister dream use robots in his correspondence? that is not for me to say. an even more terrible thought followed the first one. is mister dream himself a robot? you have seen his picture on line, haven’t you? and seen and heard interviews with him?’ yes, and read three biogrophies of him. i liked melissa t casey’s the best. well there you go. now i am going to ask you again to turn around and leave. it is a long way back to the quaintly rustic train station. the guard took a phone off his belt. if you like, i can call and have a snack pack of sandwiches and a couple of bottles of water brought out to you. mister dream is always considerate of his fans. i - i - this is very upsetting. do you want the snack pack and water or not? yes, i suppose so. next

novel 88 - 23. betrayal

by nick nelson

part 23 of 25

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dear joe, thank you for forwarding the chapters of your story about tucker and bradley and the painting. i like them a lot. i like them so much i am going to appropriate them. i willl take it from here. i think this is only fair, after all the encouragement and suggestions i gave you. after all, turnarbout is fair play. i trust you will not take this development in the wrong spirit. i wish you all the best in continuing your stories, both those i suggested to you and any you may come up with yourself. sincerely, your devoted friend, sebastian dream next

novel 88 - 22. murphy

by nick nelson

part 22 of 25

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i didn’t like the sound of that punk’s voice, murphy thought grimly as he went back and sat down in his chair beside the window looking out at the rain. and then it hit him. of course! the punk was just trying to get into the building. he didn’t have any friend in apartment 8 - the guy in apartment 8 probably didn’t have any friends. the punk wanted to get into the building to steal stuff. like murphy’s map! his map of hitler and stalin’s hidden treasure. murphy got up, went over the battered dresser in the corner beside the window, opened the middle drawer and felt under his socks and underwear. whew! the map was still there. to be really sure, he took the manila envelope out from under the underwear and opened it to make sure the real actual map was in it,, not something some thief had substituted. it was the real map all right. i shouldn’t be so paranoid, he thought briefly for the ten thousandth time. murphy went back to the window. the rain had slacked off a bit, but it still soothed his weary soul to look out at it. what was that? did he hear something in the corridor outside? it was hard to tell - one thing about this dump of a building - it was old and the walls were pretty thick. somebody could get murdered or have a satanic ritual in the room next door and you might not hear it. he went over to the door and listened. he could not hear anything but he could feel something. next