I’m currently working on ‘PARTYFOOD: A Novella’ in collaboration with lil brother. What follows is an excerpt. Suggestions, comments, opinions and money are all welcome.
PROLOGUE
“cud u tell teh diffrents?”
The vacancy in PARTYFOOD’s stare says he’s been daydreaming again. “wot r u TALKIN BOUT?”
“if u wud splode in S P A C E and u wud crush inna oshun … cud you FEEL teh diffrents tween em?”
“ur silly PIG. jus we cud FLOAT in dem.”
“u cant floats cuz u dont ‘gets it’ yet.” PIG’s face is a sagging caricature of depression.
“i dont get it.”
1.
The discarded remains of a week-long binge are piling up, threatening to overtake WALTAR’s lumpy, ancient beanbag chair. Someone in an adjacent apartment is blaring an old Bill Hicks’ record: “More Snickers! More Coke!!!” The phone has been ringing every twenty minutes or so for nearly three days, but WALTAR has been too drunk to bother finding it. As he shifts his weight to let out a slow, wheezing fart the ringing becomes noticeably louder. He reaches deep into the beanbag’s ass-shaped divot and comes up with the receiver.
“Heh-oh?” He hasn’t moved, let alone spoken to anyone in days and the words get stuck in his throat on their way out. “Hello?”
“WALTAR, its PARTYFOOD. haz u seen PIG?”
“What? What do you want, fag?”
“i cant find PIG. HAZ U SAW HIM?”
“oh, yeah. That little cum-rag is cowering in the corner right now. I had some friends over for a little piggy party, if you know what i …”
“SRSLY WALTAR!!!”
“Haven’t seen ‘em.” He hangs up and tosses the phone in the general direction of the toilet before taking a hefty slug of whiskey.
You can roughly estimate the length of one of these binges by the caliber of whiskey in WALTAR’s hand. He starts out running through the ranks of the Johnny Walker color wheel and ends up in realm of plastic jugs with completely forgettable names. The “Barret’s Special Blend” clutched between his swollen knees was a bad sign. The desperation would set in soon and send him, slobbering and grabbing and stinking, out into the world.
2.
But for the light pollution that suffuses much of the North American sky, an idle stargazer in southern California would almost be able to see, just above the horizon to the southwest, a small cadre of DOLPHINZ in the star-dappled sky.