Descriptive paragraph–Sixteen

Kory heaved a deep sigh as he reached the end of the road, hoisting himself up on the worn cement block that was the only barrier between the dead end and the quiet water of the Gowanus Canal. Across the way was the same view that had always been there – the grey stone of the church towers peeking out over the trees, and off to the right was the towering, brown brick skyline. Well, about as towering as you were ever going to see this far into Brooklyn. Somewhere beyond those drab buildings was Governor’s Island, and beyond that, Westside and Jersey City. You couldn’t even see the Manhattan skyline from here, he thought bitterly. There was a large building right smack dab in the way, faced in what may have once been white stucco, with a sign on it that read “Brooklyn Truck & Equip. Repair”. Degraw Street was too far south, anyway, even if the building hadn’t been directly in his line of sight.

Carlo’s crazy tendencies–Sixteen

This HAD to be shared.  I can’t believe what happened here.  I really can’t.  I was struggling for inspiration, and suddenly….  WHAM!  Carlo may be totally wacked, but sometimes he has some slightly valid points…

 

“AND THE WORLD WILL KNOOOOOOOOOW!”

James shook his head and sighed as Carlo finished his elaborate dance number with a flourish of awkward movement. “Carlo, for the last time, we’re listening to Bon Jovi. Not whatever showtunes crap you’ve got playing in your head.” Carlo ignored him completely and began humming the intro to yet another song that was specifically not playing. “Good lord, where does he hear this stuff?”

Ryan laughed and shook his head. “Screwed up as he may be, he had a good childhood. Come on, didn’t you ever watch the classics as a kid?”

“Dude, that’s not even a classic! It’s like… obscure crap. I’ve never heard it before, and now I think I’m doomed to hear it for the rest of my life!”

“Or at least until you leave.”

James scowled. “Don’t remind me.”

Michael shrugged. “I dunno,” he ventured. “I kinda like it.”

“Yes, but some of us are trying to finish an English paper. What the— Holy fish! What the hell is he doing now?”

Ryan cocked his head to the side in amusement. “Looked like some kind of flying barrel roll to me.”

The boys were sitting in their shared room, listening to – as James put it – Bon Jovi on the CD player he’d snuck from his parents’ house. Their room was significantly better furnished than any of the others in the Houses of Refuge, mostly because of James. He was one of the very few that was actually in the Houses of Refuge program completely by choice. The way he saw it, though, life in The Refuge was better than life at home – as evidenced by the fact that he frequently brought stuff to share with the boys from home, and his parents didn’t even to bother to wonder where he went most of the time.

Ryan tapped out the beat to the song on his notebook with the back end of his pencil. “Hey, Michael, what’d you get for number four?”

The dark-skinned boy glanced up at his previous work momentarily. “Uh… B. No, wait… Yeah, that one I didn’t understand the question. I just kinda guessed.”

Ryan shrugged and added the answer to his own sheet. “Don’t matter. It’s still a better guess than I had.”

With a nod, Michael went back to his work. “What’d you put for number ten?”

“F,” Ryan replied without so much as a pause.

Michael started to put that as his answer before he stopped to think about it. “Um… Ryan? There’s only four choices for each question.”

Ryan laughed. “I know. I haven’t gotten to that one yet.”

Again, James shook his head. “Dude, it is no wonder you two get such low grades. All you ever do is copy off of each other.

“Nature’s calling!” Carlo screamed suddenly, right in the middle of the second verse of his song. He grabbed James’ cell phone – the only one in the entire facility – off the bedside table and flipped it open. “Hello?”

This drew a look of shock and confusion from James and a round of hysterical laughter from Ryan. “Hey, James,” the blonde boy struggled out between gasping chuckles. “He’s rubbed his… his crazy all over your phone. You’d better… better not touch it now.”

Carlo actually looked slightly offended by this, which was impressive indeed seeing as it was the first acknowledgement he’d given that there were other people in the room. “Scab,” he said simply.

“What does that even mean?”

“Means you’re a traitor,” Carlo replied. “Kid Blink was a traitor. Sold ‘em out, he did. That’s why they called him a scab.”

Ryan blinked in astonishment. “Okay, I have no clue what he just said.”

“History!” Carlo hissed in annoyance. “Look it up, jeez! You’d think you of all people would get it.” He sighed and started over, speaking very slowly as if to make his point clear, though that did little to help. “Kid Blink turned scab. They almost beat him up for it. Would have too, if the coppers hadn’t shown up to stop them. You remember that next time you have an angry mob chasing you. Them coppers ain’t all bad.”

Ryan chuckled. “Okay, the very next time I’m being chased by an angry mob, I’ll remember not to… to scab. Whatever that means…”

Carlo just shook his head. “You have no culture.”

“And you have no sanity.”

“At least I’m not oblivious to what really goes on around me. Like some people.”

At this, Ryan scoffed outright. “Ha! No, I’m pretty sure you are, Carlo.”

Carlo just glared at him and started humming another tune, adding a little tap footwork to the song in his head, though this time he didn’t sing. Ryan went back to his work, tapping out the beat on the CD player. Then his tapping stuttered as it got mixed up with the beat to Carlo’s song, which was being sounded out against the floor in confusing contrast to the song that was playing. “Okay, man. I can’t concentrate with you doing that.”

“And I can’t concentrate with you tapping, either,” James pointed out. “Why do you have to do that whenever you listen to music? It makes it really hard to listen to anything when you’re around.”

Ryan shrugged. “Just something I do.”

“Well, could you maybe stop? It’s almost as annoying as his… weird… habits… What is he doing now?” Carlo was, in fact, in the process of trying to climb up on one of the bookcases and dance on it, though the narrow space and the presence of the wall behind him was making this feat extremely difficult. “Okay, that’s it!” James exclaimed dramatically. “I’m going to the other room to finish this!” And with that, he stuffed his notebook into his backpack and stomped out of the room. Nobody really seemed to mind.

Conversation: Jeff & Kory–Sixteen

Some conversation bit between Jeff and Kory.  It’s not finished, but I kinda really like it.  I love the dynamic that is developing between these two.  They’re very quickly becoming my main characters.  Which makes me happy, because I’m pretty much in love with Jeff Cooper.  No joke.  Kory Duchowski…  I mean, he’s cute and all, but Jeff and I have so much in common…  Eh.  Rambling.  Sorry.  On with the scene!

 

Jeff and Kory were sitting in their respective beds studying. Or, rather, Jeff was studying. Kory was doing his best to be a general pest. Though his efforts were sorely in vain, as Jeff had by now found some quite effective ways of ignoring the pesky blonde. Eventually, though, Kory resorted to plopping himself heavily on Jeff’s bed and yanking the text book clear out of his hands.

Jeff rolled his eyes. “What, Kory? I have homework. And so do you.”

“Actually, if I remember correctly,” Kory replied impishly, “you finished your homework an hour ago. So, if I’m not mistaken, this is Tony’s homework. Isn’t it?”

“Actually, it’s Justin’s—“

“Whatever,” the blonde shrugged. “It’s still not yours. So why are you doing it?”

Jeff let out an exasperated sigh as he attempted to snatch the book back. “You know very well why.”

“Because they’ll beat you up for it? I told them last time they’d be sorry if they tried to so much as touch you again.”

“Kory,” Jeff said patiently, “as nice a thought as that is, you know as well as I do that it isn’t likely to work.”

“Oh, shut it with your probability jargon.” Kory swatted at Jeff’s head and tossed the book to the floor. “I’m bored. Entertain me.”

Jeff sighed once more, though a small smile tugged at the corner of his mouth this time. “You know, behavior like this really doesn’t help Carlo’s opinion of us.”

“So?” Kory scrunched his nose up in annoyance. “Screw Carlo’s opinion. He’s completely wacko, anyway.”

“Wacko, huh?” Jeff mused, leaning back on his pillow and folding his hands behind his head. “That a technical term?”

“Dude, you’re such a dork,” Kory laughed, smacking him in the face with a pillow from his own bed before settling down on his stomach with the pillow under his chin.

“Seriously, though,” Jeff went on, “what exactly defines a person as crazy?”

“Hmm?” Kory mumbled in reply, his attention wavering.

“Well, I mean, who’s not to say we’re not all a little… Well, ‘wacko’?”

Kory just heaved a deep melodramatic sigh. “If you’re going to get all philosophical on me again, I’m gonna go make someone else entertain me.”

“Come on, Kory, I’m being serious!”

“Okay, okay,” Kory chuckled, rolling over so he could make proper eye contact. “What was it you were wanting to talk about?”

Now that he had the blonde’s full attention, though, Jeff suddenly seemed hesitant to say what was on his mind. The brunette shrugged uncomfortably. “I dunno…”

Vacant Lot scene–Sixteen

This amused me greatly, so I figured I’d share.  This came about sometime yesterday and pushed me over the 6k-word mark.  The scene itself is not yet finished, and there’s some rather irritatingly awkward description that comes before it, but this is the most interesting bit.  I hope you enjoy.

 

Carlo glanced up momentarily from listening to Ryan’s energetic and most likely over exaggerated story to take in the scene.

“Hey,” he whispered suddenly, interrupting Ryan mid sentence. “Hey, guys, hold up a sec.”

Ryan rolled his good eye as the delivery of his tale was completely ruined. “What is it, Carlo?”

Carlo gestured surreptitiously to the pair seated on the ground across the way. “Jeff and Kory,” he said simply, as if that explained the whole situation clearly.

Mark stared at them intently for a moment, then shook his head. “What about ‘em?”

Eyes widening in disbelief, Carlo gestured wildly. “What about ‘em?” he fairly shrieked, still trying to keep his voice low. “What do you mean, what about ‘em?”

This, of course, caused Mark to roll his eyes, nudging Ryan with his elbow before turning back to the rather excitable Italian and slinging an arm around his shoulders. “Carlo. Dude. How many times do we have to tell you? Nobody can read your mind, so you’re gonna have to just tell us what it is you’re seeing, man.”

Carlo’s eyes went from big as saucers to narrowed slits in point-two seconds flat. “Get that off,” he hissed. Mark removed his arm, though somewhat begrudgingly, and Carlo continued. “There’s something going on over there.”

“Dude, there’s nothing going on over there,” Ryan sighed.

“There so totally is! Why can’t you guys see it?”

“Uh… Maybe because we still don’t even know what ‘it’ is?”

With a frustrated growl, Carlo pointed forcefully in the direction of Kory, who was now lazily fondling Shadow’s ears. This was causing the mutt’s tail to swish right in Jeff’s face, bringing a rather irritated scowl from behind his glasses. Kory gave a soft chuckle before tugging on Shadow’s ear to bring him farther away from the other boy, after which Jeff shot him a grateful glance before going back to his book.

“See!” Carlo hissed again. “See! Right there! Look! Right. There. Tell me you saw that!”

Mark rolled his eyes again and seated himself comfortably against a metal bin. “I didn’t see anything unusual. What’s your conspiracy theory this time, Carlo?”

“No conspiracy,” Carlo commented, suddenly quite casual and calm.

Ryan clapped him on the shoulder. “Yeah, right. So what is it?”

Once again, Carlo glared at the hand on his shoulder. “Off!”

Ryan just chuckled and shoved him a bit, amused at the small Italian’s intense reaction to being touched. As the pieces fell into place, he only laughed harder. “Oh, come on, Itey,” he coaxed. “What’s your damage, man? You’re always convinced there’s something dastardly going on between those two. What’s it gonna take to convince you that they’re honest to goodness just really good friends?”

Carlo sighed as if in sympathy of their incredible lack of vision and shook his head. “Blink,” he said slowly, as if talking to a small child. “You just can’t see things the way I do. There’s something horrible going on right under our noses, but if you want to ignore it and pretend that everything’s all hunky-dory, well you go right on ahead. But don’t say I didn’t warn you when you walk in one day to find them… well, you know.”

Eyebrows scrunched in confusion, Ryan squinted at Carlo with his good eye. “Carlo, they don’t live in my house. How on earth am I supposed to walk in on them doing anything?”

By now the heated conversation was carrying well across the lot. Kory sat up and gently pushed Shadow out of the way, turning to Jeff and tapping his knee to get his attention. Once he had done so, he gestured over to where Carlo and Ryan were having their debate. Jeff listened silently for several moments before smiling softly and shaking his head. “Carlo and his conspiracies again?” he mumbled turning his attention halfway back to his book.

“Yup,” Kory replied matter-of-factly. Excited by the sudden burst of activity, Shadow jumped to his feet and clambered awkwardly into Kory’s lap, his tail once again slapping Jeff soundly in the face. “Shadow,” Kory muttered, somewhere between annoyed and amused but too lazy to do anything about it.

Jeff coughed a few times as he was met with a mouthful of dog hair, then watched as the friendly mutt attempted to lick at Kory’s face. “You know, you really ought to train him or something,” he commented casually.

Kory just shook his head as he pushed the dog away. “I’ve tried. I haven’t decided yet if I’m too lazy, or if he is.”

“It’s you,” Jeff said quickly, going back once more to his book. He chuckled softly as Kory launched a poorly aimed swat at his head.