Oddly Complicated
Oddly Complicated
“This is oddly complicated,” she said softly to herself, almost in a whisper, after repeating the blasted line in her head for the past ten minutes.
“What is?” he said. They sat on the sofa. She had her laptop on her lap, her feet on the coffee table’s edge. He sat next to her with a copy of Guitar Player magazine. He wasn’t reading the articles but merely looking at the pictures.
“Oh, nothing,” she said without looking at him.
He glanced over at her screen and saw a Google Docs page that was mostly blank, except for one line at the top:
This is oddly complicated.
“What is oddly complicated?” he asked, sticking a forefinger into the magazine and shifting around to face her. He’ll drool over the latest PRS model later.
“I’m starting a new story, and this is all I’ve written so far,” she said and sipped some coffee. Her stories always started with some vague, minuscule idea and blossomed into something interesting. “I don’t know; I was thinking of having the main character work on a jigsaw puzzle, and that’s why she says this.” [Are you being serious? A jigsaw puzzle? ]
“But jigsaw puzzles are meant to be complicated; nothing odd about that,” he said, taking her cup and tasting the hot black brew. “Yuck, how do you drink this stuff?” He handed the cup back to her. It was a handmade, ceramic job a friend had given to her. It had no handle, only a slot in which to slip your fingers. “You want me to massage your feet?”
“Okay.” She loved getting her feet massaged. It made her feel relaxed, and somehow ideas flowed a little better. He sat on the coffee table in front of her and put her feet in his lap. She was wearing fuzzy, striped pink and lime-green socks. “Mmm,” she murmured as his hands did their magic.
At that moment, Leap, their heat-seeking cat, jumped on the sofa and occupied the now empty, now comfortably warm space. They had found the kitten a year ago wandering around their front porch. There was no tag, and none of their neighbors knew the identity of the owner. They decided to keep it and named her Leap because it was Leap Day when they had found her. [That last part is an outright lie.]
“What if you write a story about a small-town sheriff who’s investigating a murder and he has all these different clues and he finds it very complicated?” he said, working on her big toe. The left one.
“Oddly complicated,” she corrected, eyes closed, her left hand stroking Leap’s fur. “It’s interesting, but it’s been done a million times. I need something more. I don’t know; maybe each piece of evidence points to a different potential killer. That would make it complicated…”
“But not odd.”
“Right,” she said, “but not odd.”
“Are you sure you need the oddly word in there?”
“Yep,” she said, opening her eyes, “it’s got to include those words.” She looked at the laptop screen. The four words stared back with smug intensity.
“I got it,” she said. She slammed the laptop closed and jumped up with a startling suddenness. Leap leaped. “Thanks for the foot rub.” She kissed him on top of his head and skipped down the hall to the home office, which they called the “Monkey Room.” [Don’t ask, that’s another story.] He’s witnessed this part of the process before and knows he won’t see her again for a while. He picks up the magazine and stretches out on the sofa, but a few minutes later he’s fast asleep with Leap on his stomach.
This is oddly complicated. This was the first line she wrote. She had taken a micro nap, and someone had whispered it into her ear. Not a real person, a dream person who exists in the space between sleep and wakefulness. So she wrote it down in the tattered blue notebook that lived on the nightstand. The bizarre phrase was the only thing whispered to her. Maybe she will try again later.
“Honey, do you want a muffin?”
“No, thank you.”
“It’s cranberry-orange.”
“No, thank you.”
It was the second day of Bonnie Jones’s [Think of a better name.] new position as sheriff. Her deputy, Alex Lightfoot, stuck his head inside her office and announced there had been a murder in Hunter’s Bay State Park that morning. Jones and Lightfoot headed out, sirens wailing, lights flickering off the wet leaves and cold pavement.
Two hours later, she had written six pages. She was pleased with this, but she was also hungry. She decided a turkey sandwich was in order and headed to the kitchen. From the window, she saw him outside raking leaves. The pile was massive, so he must have been out there for a while.
“You want a sandwich?” They ate and discussed the benefits of getting a Toro 51621 UltraPlus Leaf Blower/Vacuum.
A half hour later, she was back in the Monkey Room. She reread the morning’s output and was somewhat pleased. However, there was something not quite right. Sheriff Jones was fine; Lightfoot believable. Maybe the problem was with the body. [That wasn’t the problem.] The description of the body? The placement of it in the mud and leaves? No, it’s the gunshot wounds. She needed to change the actual homicide. The murderer would want to make it look like an accident.
She decided to walk over to the park at the end of their road, so she sleeved her laptop, coffeed her thermos, and Nike’d her feet. She found the bench she preferred empty and dry. She crossed her legs and thought through the story before exhuming her laptop. A leaf, golden and crisp and inspiring, landed in her lap, and she decided the victim was killed by a fall. And he has to be naked. Oh, and jelly beans are later found in his stomach by the coroner.
Okay, wait. Hold it. This is getting out of hand. Naked? Jelly beans? I can’t simply sit idly by and let this happen. I need to set things straight, and I need to do it now. So, I walked up to the bench and sat down. That’s right. I sat down next to her on the park bench. She was still holding the leaf.
“You know, I used that in another story,” I said, trying to be nonchalant.
“Excuse me,” she said. I could tell she was a little worried, seeing there were at least four other benches in the general vicinity that I might have chosen.
“The leaf,” I said, nodding toward her hand. “I used it in another story.”
“And who are you?” she said, nonplussed, scanning the park looking for witnesses or an exit route if it came to that.
“Oh, sorry. I’m John. I’m your author.”
“My what?” Confusion. It was apparent.
“Your author. You’re one of my characters. I invented you… for a story,” I said, but I didn’t think it helped any. “I apologize. I’ve never done this before. You know, actually meeting with someone who I thought up.”
“Could you please leave me alone? I’m kind of busy at the moment.” She dropped the leaf and picked up her sheathed laptop, probably to use as a shield or a weapon.
“Oh, right. Your story. It’s the reason I’m here—I wanted to speak with you about it. Jelly beans? Seriously?” Well, that got a response. Her confused look changed to… I’m not sure what it changed to, but it had changed.
“How do you know about the jelly beans? I haven’t even written it yet,” she said. Perturbed. That’s what it was. Now she was perturbed.
“Okay, let me try to explain. I’m your author…”
“You said that already.”
“…and you’re in a story I’m writing, and hopefully it’s getting oddly complicated.”
“Wait, what? What did you say?” Confused, perturbed, and… I want to say agitated.
“Oddly complicated. Yeah, I know. We’re both writing stories that we want to be oddly complicated. The thing is, I’m writing both stories, but you’re making it difficult.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” she said, clutching the laptop as if it were a frightened child. “How do you know me?”
“I told you, I invented you,” I said slowly, trying to be more comforting than shocking. “I know everything about you.”
“Okay, if you know me, what’s my name?”
“You don’t have a name. I didn’t give you one. I do that sometimes.”
“Wrong. It’s…” Confusion again. Worry mixed in.
“Look, I’m not trying to scare you or make you feel bad. Would you like a drink? A lemonade, a martini, or maybe a nice porter?”
“Yeah, I could use a vanilla porter right now,” she said with a sarcastic tone, but I could tell she was still in a bewilderment phase. So I sipped my iced tea; she sipped her vanilla porter. She kept looking at the sweating glass, then at me, and then back to the glass. “How are you doing this?”
“Easy. I simply think it up. It’s called im-ag-in-A-tion. Try it sometime.” I shouldn’t have said those words, and I immediately regretted it. She was so pretty, even with a disoriented look on her face. This was a bad idea, but I genuinely wanted her to understand the situation. So she did.
“So, I’m not real?”
“You’re real to me, and to yourself, and, in some way, to whoever reads this story, although not many people will.”
“You’re hurting my brain,” she said. “Do I even have a brain?”
“Hmm. Good question. Not completely sure. But I know your doofus boyfriend doesn’t possess a brain. He doesn’t even own a guitar. But he’s secondary—good for raking leaves and foot massages.” She stared at me again, still wondering how I knew this information. She sipped her beer. There was a little foam on her upper lip, but I didn’t say anything. She wiped it away. Funny how that works.
“I feel weird. Is that possible? For me to feel things?” she said. Concern.
“Of course,” I said, “because I just wrote it. So that’s how you feel.” I started to think I might be losing her.
“So my boyfriend doesn’t exist either?”
“Not in the way you think he does. He only exists when you need him to. For the sake of the story.” There was a forlorn look on her face now, and I started to think I should try to say something to make her feel better. We sat in silence for a while, both of us mulling things over.
“Why did you even come here?” she asked. The vanilla porter was gone; the iced tea was gone. I wanted to leave soon.
“Oh,” I said, feeling a little silly about the entire thing. “It’s not a major thing. I only wanted to tell you… um, you know, lay off the jelly beans idea, and maybe put some clothes on the victim.”
“Wow, okay. Anything else?”
“Well, you can stop telling people you found Leap on Leap Day,” I said. “It’s just not truthful.”
“Oh, you know about my cat too.” She was sounding more and more depressed, so I had to find some way to make this all better before I left.
“Tell you what,” I said. “Would you be interested in having a name? I’ll give you a name, and I’ll simply write that you forgot this entire episode with me. How does that sound?”
“Um… Yeah, I guess. It might be cool if I had a name.”
“Great! Do you want to pick it or should I?” She was deep in thought for a minute.
“Allison.”
“Allison?”
“With two Ls.”
“Works for me,” I said, trying to sound upbeat, knowing it was the end of the line for her. There will be no murder story, no naked guy, no jelly beans, no Toro leaf blower/vacuum, or no fuzzy, striped pink and lime-green socks. I got up from the bench and wished her luck. She smiled woefully.
“Thanks for the beer,” she said.
“My pleasure, Allison,” I said and turned to leave. A minute later, as I was veering off the main path, I turned and looked at her again. She was still sitting on the bench but had the laptop out and was typing intensely.
“This is oddly complicated,” Sheriff Jones said to the homicide detective from the county office. “We have a man in his sixties. Contusions and fractures are commensurate with a high fall. But there are no rips and tears in his clothing [Good going, Allison.] which might have been caused by tree branches.”
I made my way out of the park and headed home. I’m going to miss Allison, I thought to myself. I should have told her to find another boyfriend. These were the sorts of things I was thinking when my phone rang. I hate phones, so I ignored it. The phone kept ringing. Aren’t phones supposed to stop ringing after a certain number of times? This is what I was thinking while trying to ignore the phone. But since I was thinking about the phone, you could hardly say I was succeeding at ignoring it. I dug the noisy thing out of my pocket and looked at the screen. Private caller.
“Hullo?” I spoke into the now quiet thing.
“John?” a female voice said.
“Yes. Who’s this?”
“This is Jen, your author,” came the reply.
“Ha ha,” I said. I didn’t laugh; I just said the word ha twice. Sarcasm. “Is this Allison?”
“Allison doesn’t own a phone; you didn’t write one in for her,” Jen said flatly. Okay, I have to admit that at that point I was feeling a little uneasy. I decided to play it cool and go along with the charade.
“So I gave her a laptop but no phone?” I said.
“Correct. I think you knew that already,” Jen said.
“What do you want, Jen?” I said. “You’re using up my minutes.”
“You have unlimited minutes. This conversation can literally be limitless,” Jen said.
“I have things to do, so I’m going to need to say bye-bye now,” I said.
“You never say the phrase bye-bye; I threw it in there so I could say you never say bye-bye.” She was starting to hurt my brain, and I understood how Allison must have felt. “And what do you need to do that’s so important?” I had to contemplate this, because I wasn’t expecting to be called on it.
“Things,” I said unconvincingly.
“Good one,” Jen said. “Look, you fucked up. You’re not supposed to go and meet your characters. Just because she’s an attractive woman doesn’t mean you can go meet her on a bench in a park in a town that doesn’t exist. And, by the way, you don’t need to make all your female characters attractive and all the male ones doofuses.”
“I…” I started but didn’t know where I was going. I had stopped walking, phone to my ear (the left one), mouth open. “That’s just not true,” I said finally, trying to think of an unattractive female character. “And who the hell are you, really?” Diversion tactic.
“I told you. I’m writing this story; you’re my character, and I need you to stop meeting the characters in your stories. It screws up the flow.” She had a nice voice; I wondered how she looked.
“No, I’m writing this story, and you’re my character!” I shouted when I didn’t need to—phones come with amplification. “And you aren’t very attractive, Jen, I must say.” Low blow, but I was desperate.
“Um… you’ve never even met me,” Jen said with a calmness I despised. “And don’t despise me because I’m calm. Calm people make the world go ’round. Think about it.” I thought about it. I didn’t agree, but I didn’t want to start another argument.
“Don’t you think it’s awfully suspicious the names ‘Jen’ and ‘John’ sound so similar?” I said. “You only need to adjust your larynx a little, or some other thingy in your mouth, and you’re saying the other name.” There was silence on the other end for a few moments.
“You should never use the word awfully,” she said. “It’s the worst adverb, possibly the worst word ever, in the history of language.”
“Well, you’re the one who wrote it, if you are indeed writing this story,” I said. I heard her sigh on the other end, and I wondered where that other end was. “Why don’t you come down to the park and we’ll pretend to discuss this as if we were two rational adults?” I said, knowing it wasn’t feasible and it would break her rule, which I wrote, and which I also broke. Unless she actually was writing this and didn’t want to break her own rule.
“Well, I’m going to let you go now, John,” Jen said, still being all calm and whatnot. “Why don’t you go finish your complicated…”
“Oddly complicated,” I reminded her. I heard her sigh again.
“...oddly [sarcastically overemphasized ] complicated story,” she continued. “And please try to stay out of your characters’… um, lives.”
“Okay, Jen. Well, it was awfully nice talking to you,” I said. (I just had to.) We hung up at the same time, and I shoved the phone into my pocket. “Private caller,” I mumbled out loud to nobody in particular. “Never answering one of those again.” I decided to go back and see if Allison was still on the bench. She wasn’t. I knew that already. She was failing at writing an oddly complicated story, and so was I.
When Allison got home, she still remembered our conversation in the park, because I forgot to write the part where she would forget about meeting me. She took her phone off the charger and checked for messages. None. [How could there be? She just now got the phone.] She gave Leap some fresh water and headed into the Monkey Room to resume her story.
When I got home, I was still a little perturbed over my conversation with Jen. Who did she think she was? My author. Ha! But she did know a lot about me, and she even knew Allison, although Allison wasn’t even Allison a few minutes before our conversation about Allison. I decided to call Allison.
“Um… hello?” Allison said.
“Hi, it’s John,” I said. “How do you like your new phone?”
“It’s nice, I guess,” Allison said. “What do you want? Why do I still remember you?”
“I called to apologize for my appearance this afternoon. I shouldn’t have invaded your personal space in that disrespectful way. It was wrong, and I’m sorry.” Thoughtful contemplation on the other end. “And I’m sorry I forgot to make you forget, but I’ll get right on it.”
“It’s okay,” she said meekly. “You don’t need to—I’ve accepted the fact I’m only a character you invented.” She paused, but I knew she had more to say, so I let her finish. “And, you were right, the jelly bean angle was a stupid idea. In fact, the whole story is kinda dumb. I think I’ll start the whole thing over. And I won’t lie to people about Leap anymore. It wasn’t even a leap year.” She let out an attractive little laugh [Okay, it was a normal-sounding laugh.], and I knew she was going to be all right.
“That’s good to hear,” I said. “I wish you luck on your story and whatever you decide to do.” [Meaning: find a new boyfriend.] My phone did a shimmy, and I saw that Jen was calling. I rolled my eyes and said, “I gotta go, Allison. Sorry about all the confusion. It was nice meeting you.”
“You, too,” Allison said, and we both disconnected.
“Hi, Jen,” I said into the thing I wanted to throw away. “Run out of people to bother?”
“John, what were we just talking about literally five minutes ago?” She didn’t sound pleased. Calmness depleted.
“I’m fine, how are you?” I said.
“I don’t have much time; I’m waiting for the mail lady. I’m going to need you to stop all this confabulating with your characters.” [Confabulating? ]
“Look,” I said. “I wanted to apologize to Allison, and now I’m done with her. So say hi to Loretta, for me and I’m pretty sure your peanut butter cookies are burning.”
“Oh, shoot,” she squawked, and I heard a blustering of movement and noise. I disconnected, and that was the last I heard from Jen. I sighed and put the phone in my sock drawer.
Well, that was an interesting afternoon.
Maybe I will have one of those cranberry-orange muffins.
