Ryan C. Thomas's Blog, page 2
October 16, 2015
2 new Novels
Just a quick update that I have completed 2 new Novels, one of which is the 3rd Roger Huntington book. More info coming soon.
August 11, 2015
The truth of Bugboy
I thought, in light of some readers commenting on the characters in the group home scenes being unrealistically cruel, that I would provide some background for why they act so mean.
Unfortunately the stuff in that book happened mostly the way I lived it (the group home stuff, obviously, not the supernatural jazz). After college I went to work in a group home for a year in south Rhode Island in order to save money to move to NYC. We had some bad caretakers in that house, and two that were borderline physically abusive and certainly mentally abusive to people who were developmentally disabled. I witnessed it a few times but by then they'd already been reported by other people. They were found out and quit before it became something bigger...but it happened. (The worst incident I remember was an autistic non verbal, incontinent man with PICA being put to bed without his diaper. They found him in his room in the morning eating his own shit. He had also smeared it all over the walls, curtains, his bed linens, etc. The man responsible for this treatment quit after others exposed him for other abusive behaviors including holding clients down and giving them noogies.)
The company I worked for was not to blame. The people who ran the company and who managed the houses were incredibly dedicated to helping the clients and to never having a repeat of the Ladd years (see next paragraph). It's not their fault bad seeds got through the interview process. Sometimes it's the cruelest people who come across as the friendliest in an interview. We've all heard someone say,"But he seemed like such a nice guy," at some point in our life.
Also in the book is an allusion to an older group home facility full of much more abuse. This was based on the infamous Ladd School in Exeter RI, which was shut down due to scandals of reprehensible abuse and cruel living conditions for mentally challenged people. One of the client's in the house I worked in did in fact come from the Ladd Center (or so I was told), and it's no wonder he got upset one day and bit me so hard I had to to go the hospital. It was how he learned to survive in Ladd. I didn't blame him. I quite liked him, in fact. Needles to say he was not punished in any way. You can read about the horrible conditions they suffered on this site: The Ladd School. I have been to the Ladd School's abandoned homes many times in my life--as a teenager, my friends and I used to explore their remains on boring weekends. It was beyond creepy. Out in the woods near some old graveyards, nothing else around for miles.
I must mention that there were people, including my friend's mother, who worked at the Ladd Center and tried to expose the truth to the detriment of their own safety. I believe my friend's mother found her tires slashed on a few occasions for speaking out against the injustices. This was in the years just before all Ladd facilities in the state were shut down in 1994.
Anyway, I just wanted to mention the background info I used for some of those characters and situations. If any of you get around to reading it, whether you like the book or not, just know those parts are true. Sadly. I wish they weren't.
And now for a happy thought...kittens!
Unfortunately the stuff in that book happened mostly the way I lived it (the group home stuff, obviously, not the supernatural jazz). After college I went to work in a group home for a year in south Rhode Island in order to save money to move to NYC. We had some bad caretakers in that house, and two that were borderline physically abusive and certainly mentally abusive to people who were developmentally disabled. I witnessed it a few times but by then they'd already been reported by other people. They were found out and quit before it became something bigger...but it happened. (The worst incident I remember was an autistic non verbal, incontinent man with PICA being put to bed without his diaper. They found him in his room in the morning eating his own shit. He had also smeared it all over the walls, curtains, his bed linens, etc. The man responsible for this treatment quit after others exposed him for other abusive behaviors including holding clients down and giving them noogies.)
The company I worked for was not to blame. The people who ran the company and who managed the houses were incredibly dedicated to helping the clients and to never having a repeat of the Ladd years (see next paragraph). It's not their fault bad seeds got through the interview process. Sometimes it's the cruelest people who come across as the friendliest in an interview. We've all heard someone say,"But he seemed like such a nice guy," at some point in our life.
Also in the book is an allusion to an older group home facility full of much more abuse. This was based on the infamous Ladd School in Exeter RI, which was shut down due to scandals of reprehensible abuse and cruel living conditions for mentally challenged people. One of the client's in the house I worked in did in fact come from the Ladd Center (or so I was told), and it's no wonder he got upset one day and bit me so hard I had to to go the hospital. It was how he learned to survive in Ladd. I didn't blame him. I quite liked him, in fact. Needles to say he was not punished in any way. You can read about the horrible conditions they suffered on this site: The Ladd School. I have been to the Ladd School's abandoned homes many times in my life--as a teenager, my friends and I used to explore their remains on boring weekends. It was beyond creepy. Out in the woods near some old graveyards, nothing else around for miles.
I must mention that there were people, including my friend's mother, who worked at the Ladd Center and tried to expose the truth to the detriment of their own safety. I believe my friend's mother found her tires slashed on a few occasions for speaking out against the injustices. This was in the years just before all Ladd facilities in the state were shut down in 1994.
Anyway, I just wanted to mention the background info I used for some of those characters and situations. If any of you get around to reading it, whether you like the book or not, just know those parts are true. Sadly. I wish they weren't.
And now for a happy thought...kittens!
July 31, 2015
The Summer I Died Movie update
Well, the long and the short of it is Riothouse Productions has not been in touch with me for months. The option has run out, and despite them telling me a new contract is coming, I haven't heard anything. At this point, I'm not holding my breath. They are great people, don't get me wrong, so there's no ill will on my part at all. Sometimes things just fall through. But I feel like it's time to announce that the movie option is no longer in their hands.
I did talk to another director who has some movies on netflix, and he is interested in doing the film as well, but I have no contract with him either. We've talked on the phone and through email quite a bit though. He seems to have a good idea of how to make the movie. Currently, he just finished a new film and is doing all the marketing and hoopla that goes along with it so maybe I will hear from him in a month or so.
In the meantime, I will keep trying to find someone to make this sucker into a film. Feel free to spread the word that the option is available again. Any help is appreciated.
Thank you to everyone who has bought and supported the books.
Oh, and the 3rd novel is done. Finito. In the can. I just need to make some edits on it so it's probably going to be a couple more months--fatherhood has made it difficult to find time to edit. But I promise I will get it done asap.
best!
Ryan
I did talk to another director who has some movies on netflix, and he is interested in doing the film as well, but I have no contract with him either. We've talked on the phone and through email quite a bit though. He seems to have a good idea of how to make the movie. Currently, he just finished a new film and is doing all the marketing and hoopla that goes along with it so maybe I will hear from him in a month or so.
In the meantime, I will keep trying to find someone to make this sucker into a film. Feel free to spread the word that the option is available again. Any help is appreciated.
Thank you to everyone who has bought and supported the books.
Oh, and the 3rd novel is done. Finito. In the can. I just need to make some edits on it so it's probably going to be a couple more months--fatherhood has made it difficult to find time to edit. But I promise I will get it done asap.
best!
Ryan
February 26, 2015
Roger Huntington 3
It's almost done. I promise. I swear I've been writing it, but I had a baby (okay, my wife did) and we moved to a new house, and time has been a precious commodity. BUT, it's coming, I assure you. In the meantime, here's chapter 1. Mind you, this may be different from the final book (editing and all that jazz)...but I hope it leaves you wanting more.
UNTITLED ROGER HUNTINGTON BOOK 3
by Ryan C. Thomas
Chapter 1
I didn’t know if it was a record that Guinness would consider, but I’d been in Berlin exactly one hour before I found myself nose-deep in a psychotic girl’s crotch while she pressed a switchblade against my balls.
Mind you, I’ve never been good with girls. Throughout my thirty years they’ve laughed at me, thrown drinks in my face, called me nerd and dork and every variation of loser I can think of. One actually hit me with her purse. Like she was an old woman and I was a thief. That happened in a bar a couple years ago. She thought I said she smelled shitty. I said she smelled pretty. Truth be told she smelled like a petting zoo, no doubt due to an army of cats she had at home. Purses fucking hurt, by the way. They've got buckles and zippers and buttons and all types of metal shit that knows exactly where the bridge of your nose is.
But sometimes rejection still hurts more in the end. Except for me, because I’d been used to it all my life. As my buddy Tooth used to say, don’t sweat rejection, dude, there’s more pussy in the sea.
He wasn’t much for metaphors.
To his credit, if he ever did see pussy in the sea, like just a lone vagina floating in the waves, all flapping and undulating, he would have screwed it for sure.
Despite all my bad luck with girls, however, I’d never had one shoulder-throw me to the ground just because I asked if she knew where James Peter Fountai—
That’s as far as I got before wham! My head hit so hard I saw stars.
Her free hand closed on my throat and squeezed. “Who are you?”
“Roger,” I mumbled, my chin rubbing against her jeans in an area that I normally associated with happy thoughts. That I could see the outline of her underwear and was getting an erection was something I would deal with later at therapy. If I lived.
“Roger who? Why are you here? What do you want? Answer me!”
I felt the dagger tip slip through my own jeans, felt my testicles try to retreat all the way up into my chest. “Huntington. Peter Fountain invited me. For the Star Wars prequels to have never been made.”
She looked up at the large muscular man leaning against the wall next to us. “The fuck is he talking about?”
Muscle Man wore an army green sweater and sunglasses. His knuckles were raw and bloody and his black jeans were torn at the knees. Recent scrapes and cuts stitched across his cheeks. He’d seen some kind of action in the last hour. Probably out murdering more Americans asking for directions. “I dunno,” he said, “I thought the prequels were pretty good. That annoying pidgin talking alien was a cock, but the red-faced guy, he was pretty bad ass. And I liked all the trade federation robots. What was it they said? Roger Roger? ”
“Kill me now,” I mumbled.
“I heard that,” Switchblade Girl replied. “And if you don’t get real serious real fucking quick, I will plunge this knife up into the nub you call a dick and let you bleed out in front of me.”
“I told you. Peter Fountain asked me to come here. I swear to you, I’m not lying.”
“Here?”
“Yes, here, this apartment in East Berlin. I’ve got a piece of paper in my pocket with this address written on it. He told it to me over the phone when I got to the airport. He said someone would be waiting for me. I assumed it would be him.”
She looked up up at her cohort, eased up her grip on my neck. “Oh fuck. This is the guy?”
Muscle Man detached himself from the wall and leaned over me, his face upside down in my view. “You mean to tell us you’re the guy that kills killers? The stone cold fucking murdering crazy bastard that cuts baddies’ heads off? You?”
I swallowed, thankful my Adam’s apple was still functioning. “I paint too.”
Slowly, Switchblade Girl rolled off of me, removing her knife from my groin. She flicked it closed, stuffed it in the inside pocket of her brown leather jacket. “I’m sorry, I thought you were someone else. ‘Roger,’ you said?” She offered her hand to me and I took it, letting her help me get up. Her palms were hot and her fingers were soft and I was aware, after I made it to my feet, that her eyes were now drawn down to the bulge in my pants.
Muscle Man said, “Knives give him a hard on. Definitely a serial killer.”
I turned away from her, suddenly embarrassed. Not that I should have been, considering she’d just tried to castrate me. I should have been furious, screaming at her, demanding some form of reparation. But some things just come to me innately, and trying to not look foolish in front of women is one of them. I gave myself a quick push down and faced her again. “Yes, my name’s Roger. And I’m still very confused as to what is going on here. Is this Peter’s place or not? Where is he?”
“Not here,” she said, moving now to the small kitchen where she opened a pantry and took out three cans of soda. She returned and offered me one, threw the other to Muscle Man. “Katrin,” she said.
“Whos’ that?” I asked.
“Me, ya cock.”
“Right.” I turned to Muscle Man. “And you are…?”
“Not gay, so don’t get any ideas.”
Echoes of Tooth. That tough guy attitude showcased for self-preservation. I knew this guy better than he thought and I had no trouble calling him on his shit, even if he could kick my ass. “No worries,” I told him, “I don’t like flabby tits on men.”
He stepped at me, puffed up his chest. “But you’d like ‘em if they was dicks.”
I was confused. “Tit dicks?”
“Tit dicks you’d like to suck, I bet. Boom.” He cocked his head. “This is getting weird. Be a lot easier if I just punch you, yeah?”
“He’s fucking with you,” Katrin said, patting my shoulder. “He’s Craig. You get used to him. Well, maybe not the smell.”
I saw my suitcase on its side near the door, where it had fallen out of my hands when Katrin took me down. I snatched it up and set it on a chair beside a small table. For the first time I was able to take in the apartment, which was bigger than most houses I’d been in. More of a massive loft when you got down to it. I surmised that several adjoining apartments had had their walls knocked down to create one conjoined space. What appeared to be a series of bedrooms was across from the large living room, furnished with three couches and a giant flat screen television. A bathroom was behind me, and next to the kitchen was a dining area.
Windows ran around most of the main living area, and even from where I stood I could see the shops lining the street below us. It was a grand view of busting East Berlin. Small eateries and liquor stores and delis, custom clothing boutiques and such. There were a lot of people out walking, plenty of them on cell phones, just like back in America. The occasional taxi went by, followed by sedans and delivery trucks. It almost looked like parts of New York City, without the trash, bums, and religious zealots waving signs on the street corners.
The one stark difference was the line of buildings off in the distance to the south. Large concrete blocks, every one of them the same. I’d seen pictures of them in magazines and books about the Cold War. Housing blocs. Cold, depressing, designed to stifle free thought. Stick some bars on the windows and they'd look just like prisons. Instead of tearing them down, the people of Berlin had transformed them into supermarkets and restaurants and superstores. I knew this because I could see the neon signs on them even from this distance. The new world and the old world comingling for the sake of commerce.
Just beyond them were the gold horsemen of the Brandenburg Gate. I could only see a snippet of it, but what I saw was pretty amazing. I’d have to go check it out the first chance I got.
“You’re early,” Craig said. “We weren’t expecting you till way later.”
“My ticket was upgraded. They put me on an earlier flight. So Peter is coming back?” I asked. “Or do I just hang out here and stitch up my scrotum?”
“He’s back in an hour,” Katrin said. “And I suppose I’m sorry about the knife thing. We’ve had some people skulking around. A couple men in suits showed up here the other day. They took pictures of us then left. It was weird.”
I had to agree with her on that one. “Took pictures of you? Like, just came in and snapped off…pictures?”
“Like I said. It was fucking weird. So yeah, we’re a little on edge.”
What had I gotten myself into? “Well I don’t have a camera, just clothes. Peter gave me the combination for the keypad. If he’d told me I was entering a ninja den I would have knocked louder.”
“Didn’t hear you knock at all,” Craig said, tossing his empty soda can into the trash. “Maybe try using some muscle next time, mate. We build our structures strong over here.”
“Yeah, well, I guess I’m sorry I just walked in. Considering you’re on high alert. I take it you have no idea what they wanted?”
Katrin took a seat on the couch across from the television and started flipping channels. “Fuck no. And that’s what concerns us. There’s nothing here worth a damn, and Craig and I got nothing major on our records that should raise heads. But they snapped a half dozen pics, swept some kinda wand thingy into the room, then turned and jogged off before Craig could get himself outta bed.”
“It was early. Sue me,” Craig said. "By the time I got down to the street they were in a car and gone."
Letting go of the fact they each had records, I wondered briefly if Katrin and Craig were a couple, but judging by the way he took a seat clear across the room from her, I was banking more on them being roomates. “Put on the game,” he said.
“Fuck off,” Katrin replied. “And go clean yourself. You’re getting blood on shit.” Craig huffed and she settled on something that looked like a crime drama, only I couldn’t be sure because I had only studied my Learn German in an Hour ebook for about five minutes, right up to the part where it said most Germans speak fluent English.
She put the remote under her and glared at Craig, as if to say, try and get it. He rolled his eyes and took out his phone, started fussing with it.
I cleared my throat, not quite sure what else to do.
She looked over the back of the couch at me. “That noise for me?”
“What? No. I just—"
“I’m not the entertainment, you know. Either pull up a seat and chill out or go unpack. That room over there is vacant. You might as well take it. There’s wifi in the apartment but Peter has rules against us giving it out. You’ll have to wait for him to arrive to get it from him. If you’re hungry there’s meats and cheese in the fridge. Make a sandwich or go to the deli on the corner and get a sausage or something. Beyond that stay quiet because I’m watching this.”
“You’re watching shit,” Craig said, fingering one of the cuts on his cheek.
Then something happened. Katrin sort of…changed. The look she gave Craig was so focused I swear I felt the hair on my arm stand up. Her eyes narrowed and her lips grew thin. Craig gulped and shook his head. “Stop looking at me,” he said, then stood up and went to a room off the living room, slammed his door and turned on his stereo loud enough to shake the walls. There was a screech a second later as he plugged in headphones (or so I assumed) and the apartment was quiet again.
I had no idea what that was all about and I wasn’t about to ask. If she was serious about Peter coming back in an hour, I’d just wait it out on my own, in my new room. Or I could go hail a cab and get a ride back to the airport, I figured. Peter hadn’t told me I’d be staying in the looney bin with these two nutjobs and I was already hearing that voice in my head that said I should run away. Not Skinny Man’s voice, thankfully, which had grown quiet these late few weeks, just that voice of reason that keeps us all alive. Call it your gut, call it intuition, it was warning me that living here was going to be hell on Earth.
I brought my stuff into the empty bedroom and sat on the bed. The room was bare, save for a painting of a church on the wall. Maybe it was a real church, maybe it was made up, I didn’t know. I scanned my phone for any messages from Peter or my patents but there was nothing. I’d sworn off social media after the episode with the cannibals in San Diego because I was getting too many weird messages from sickos getting off on my ordeal, so there was no one to engage with.
Except Tooth, who I swear I could hear somewhere in the room, chuckling. I knew it was just my screwed up mind playing tricks again, just like when I heard Skinny Man, but I wanted so bad to believe he was real and could hear me. I needed a real friend. “This place kind of sucks,” I said.
“Dude, Katrin is totally hot.” Tooth’s voice sounded like it was in front of me now. “Go talk to her. Maybe say something insulting so she sits on your face again. Most action you’ve seen in months.”
“She was trying to stab my taint. She doesn’t want to talk to me.”
“God you’re being such a pussy. She knew what she was doing, and I could tell when she saw your pathetic lightsabre at half-mast she was proud of herself. Girls like to know they can give you boner, man. Don’t you know anything.”
“I’m not going to talk to her. I’m not gonna talk to anyone until Peter gets here and tells me what the flying fuck this is all about.”
I could almost kind of see Tooth now, which happened when my mind was really working overtime. He leaned against the dresser and fussed with his hat. “Fine, be a wuss. You like it here, In Berlin. Remember those Nazi fucks we kicked the shit out of that time? Must be tons of ‘em here, right?”
“I don’t think Germany is like that anymore, Tooth. Seems to me they’re trying real hard to not be associated it with that stuff anymore. Everyone I’ve met is polite. Well, except for the two people in the other room, one of whom is clearly British and one of whom defended herself against a strange man in her apartment so I can’t blame her too much. ”
“You’re losing me.”
“I’m saying there’s no Nazis here. Let it go.”
“How can there not be? It was like, their grandfathers and shit.”
“And our grandfather’s made black people use separate bathrooms. And our great grandfathers kept them in cages and whipped them if they didn’t pick cotton. Times change, you know, and new generations do their best to atone for their ancestors’ atrocities.”
“Fine, there’s no Nazis. But you know what is here?
“Your dick cheese. Stinking up my new bedroom.”
“Well yes, but I’m talking about beer, you cumstain. You’re in the fucking motherland and I’m so jealous I wanna punch you in the head. Get off your ass and go ask Katrin to take you somewhere to get a German beer. Then, you get her good and drunk, bring her back here, and get some German pussy. C’mon, man, at least let me live vicariously through you. Go ask her.”
I unzipped my suitcase and rifled through it for my phone charger. “I’m not asking her. She clearly doesn’t like me and I do not want to get on her bad side.”
“Same old Roger. Still afraid of girls. Jesus.”
“Fuck you, Tooth. I’m not afraid of girls, or anyone else for that matter. I just don’t see the point of pissing off my roommate. You wanna date Katrin so bad, you go talk to her. I’m not asking her so let it go.”
There was a new voice behind me: “Who’re you talking to?”
I looked up, saw Katrin standing in the doorway to my room. She had the remote control in one hand and her soda in the other.
“No one,” I said, embarrassed that she’d caught me having one of my conversations with a dead person. “Just talking to myself.”
She looked me up and down, scanned the room, then took another step in and looked at all the walls. Like she could smell something but couldn’t place it. “Well tell your other self to keep it down and tell him I’m not in the mood for beer now. Peter called and said he’s coming to get you. He’ll be here in a couple minutes. Says you’re going out so grab a jacket and be ready.”
She turned and left the room. I could feel my jaw hanging open as I searched around for Tooth. His image was gone, as was his voice. I sat on the bed and stared blankly into the air before me.
How the hell had she known Tooth suggested I ask her to get a beer?
UNTITLED ROGER HUNTINGTON BOOK 3
by Ryan C. Thomas
Chapter 1
I didn’t know if it was a record that Guinness would consider, but I’d been in Berlin exactly one hour before I found myself nose-deep in a psychotic girl’s crotch while she pressed a switchblade against my balls.
Mind you, I’ve never been good with girls. Throughout my thirty years they’ve laughed at me, thrown drinks in my face, called me nerd and dork and every variation of loser I can think of. One actually hit me with her purse. Like she was an old woman and I was a thief. That happened in a bar a couple years ago. She thought I said she smelled shitty. I said she smelled pretty. Truth be told she smelled like a petting zoo, no doubt due to an army of cats she had at home. Purses fucking hurt, by the way. They've got buckles and zippers and buttons and all types of metal shit that knows exactly where the bridge of your nose is.
But sometimes rejection still hurts more in the end. Except for me, because I’d been used to it all my life. As my buddy Tooth used to say, don’t sweat rejection, dude, there’s more pussy in the sea.
He wasn’t much for metaphors.
To his credit, if he ever did see pussy in the sea, like just a lone vagina floating in the waves, all flapping and undulating, he would have screwed it for sure.
Despite all my bad luck with girls, however, I’d never had one shoulder-throw me to the ground just because I asked if she knew where James Peter Fountai—
That’s as far as I got before wham! My head hit so hard I saw stars.
Her free hand closed on my throat and squeezed. “Who are you?”
“Roger,” I mumbled, my chin rubbing against her jeans in an area that I normally associated with happy thoughts. That I could see the outline of her underwear and was getting an erection was something I would deal with later at therapy. If I lived.
“Roger who? Why are you here? What do you want? Answer me!”
I felt the dagger tip slip through my own jeans, felt my testicles try to retreat all the way up into my chest. “Huntington. Peter Fountain invited me. For the Star Wars prequels to have never been made.”
She looked up at the large muscular man leaning against the wall next to us. “The fuck is he talking about?”
Muscle Man wore an army green sweater and sunglasses. His knuckles were raw and bloody and his black jeans were torn at the knees. Recent scrapes and cuts stitched across his cheeks. He’d seen some kind of action in the last hour. Probably out murdering more Americans asking for directions. “I dunno,” he said, “I thought the prequels were pretty good. That annoying pidgin talking alien was a cock, but the red-faced guy, he was pretty bad ass. And I liked all the trade federation robots. What was it they said? Roger Roger? ”
“Kill me now,” I mumbled.
“I heard that,” Switchblade Girl replied. “And if you don’t get real serious real fucking quick, I will plunge this knife up into the nub you call a dick and let you bleed out in front of me.”
“I told you. Peter Fountain asked me to come here. I swear to you, I’m not lying.”
“Here?”
“Yes, here, this apartment in East Berlin. I’ve got a piece of paper in my pocket with this address written on it. He told it to me over the phone when I got to the airport. He said someone would be waiting for me. I assumed it would be him.”
She looked up up at her cohort, eased up her grip on my neck. “Oh fuck. This is the guy?”
Muscle Man detached himself from the wall and leaned over me, his face upside down in my view. “You mean to tell us you’re the guy that kills killers? The stone cold fucking murdering crazy bastard that cuts baddies’ heads off? You?”
I swallowed, thankful my Adam’s apple was still functioning. “I paint too.”
Slowly, Switchblade Girl rolled off of me, removing her knife from my groin. She flicked it closed, stuffed it in the inside pocket of her brown leather jacket. “I’m sorry, I thought you were someone else. ‘Roger,’ you said?” She offered her hand to me and I took it, letting her help me get up. Her palms were hot and her fingers were soft and I was aware, after I made it to my feet, that her eyes were now drawn down to the bulge in my pants.
Muscle Man said, “Knives give him a hard on. Definitely a serial killer.”
I turned away from her, suddenly embarrassed. Not that I should have been, considering she’d just tried to castrate me. I should have been furious, screaming at her, demanding some form of reparation. But some things just come to me innately, and trying to not look foolish in front of women is one of them. I gave myself a quick push down and faced her again. “Yes, my name’s Roger. And I’m still very confused as to what is going on here. Is this Peter’s place or not? Where is he?”
“Not here,” she said, moving now to the small kitchen where she opened a pantry and took out three cans of soda. She returned and offered me one, threw the other to Muscle Man. “Katrin,” she said.
“Whos’ that?” I asked.
“Me, ya cock.”
“Right.” I turned to Muscle Man. “And you are…?”
“Not gay, so don’t get any ideas.”
Echoes of Tooth. That tough guy attitude showcased for self-preservation. I knew this guy better than he thought and I had no trouble calling him on his shit, even if he could kick my ass. “No worries,” I told him, “I don’t like flabby tits on men.”
He stepped at me, puffed up his chest. “But you’d like ‘em if they was dicks.”
I was confused. “Tit dicks?”
“Tit dicks you’d like to suck, I bet. Boom.” He cocked his head. “This is getting weird. Be a lot easier if I just punch you, yeah?”
“He’s fucking with you,” Katrin said, patting my shoulder. “He’s Craig. You get used to him. Well, maybe not the smell.”
I saw my suitcase on its side near the door, where it had fallen out of my hands when Katrin took me down. I snatched it up and set it on a chair beside a small table. For the first time I was able to take in the apartment, which was bigger than most houses I’d been in. More of a massive loft when you got down to it. I surmised that several adjoining apartments had had their walls knocked down to create one conjoined space. What appeared to be a series of bedrooms was across from the large living room, furnished with three couches and a giant flat screen television. A bathroom was behind me, and next to the kitchen was a dining area.
Windows ran around most of the main living area, and even from where I stood I could see the shops lining the street below us. It was a grand view of busting East Berlin. Small eateries and liquor stores and delis, custom clothing boutiques and such. There were a lot of people out walking, plenty of them on cell phones, just like back in America. The occasional taxi went by, followed by sedans and delivery trucks. It almost looked like parts of New York City, without the trash, bums, and religious zealots waving signs on the street corners.
The one stark difference was the line of buildings off in the distance to the south. Large concrete blocks, every one of them the same. I’d seen pictures of them in magazines and books about the Cold War. Housing blocs. Cold, depressing, designed to stifle free thought. Stick some bars on the windows and they'd look just like prisons. Instead of tearing them down, the people of Berlin had transformed them into supermarkets and restaurants and superstores. I knew this because I could see the neon signs on them even from this distance. The new world and the old world comingling for the sake of commerce.
Just beyond them were the gold horsemen of the Brandenburg Gate. I could only see a snippet of it, but what I saw was pretty amazing. I’d have to go check it out the first chance I got.
“You’re early,” Craig said. “We weren’t expecting you till way later.”
“My ticket was upgraded. They put me on an earlier flight. So Peter is coming back?” I asked. “Or do I just hang out here and stitch up my scrotum?”
“He’s back in an hour,” Katrin said. “And I suppose I’m sorry about the knife thing. We’ve had some people skulking around. A couple men in suits showed up here the other day. They took pictures of us then left. It was weird.”
I had to agree with her on that one. “Took pictures of you? Like, just came in and snapped off…pictures?”
“Like I said. It was fucking weird. So yeah, we’re a little on edge.”
What had I gotten myself into? “Well I don’t have a camera, just clothes. Peter gave me the combination for the keypad. If he’d told me I was entering a ninja den I would have knocked louder.”
“Didn’t hear you knock at all,” Craig said, tossing his empty soda can into the trash. “Maybe try using some muscle next time, mate. We build our structures strong over here.”
“Yeah, well, I guess I’m sorry I just walked in. Considering you’re on high alert. I take it you have no idea what they wanted?”
Katrin took a seat on the couch across from the television and started flipping channels. “Fuck no. And that’s what concerns us. There’s nothing here worth a damn, and Craig and I got nothing major on our records that should raise heads. But they snapped a half dozen pics, swept some kinda wand thingy into the room, then turned and jogged off before Craig could get himself outta bed.”
“It was early. Sue me,” Craig said. "By the time I got down to the street they were in a car and gone."
Letting go of the fact they each had records, I wondered briefly if Katrin and Craig were a couple, but judging by the way he took a seat clear across the room from her, I was banking more on them being roomates. “Put on the game,” he said.
“Fuck off,” Katrin replied. “And go clean yourself. You’re getting blood on shit.” Craig huffed and she settled on something that looked like a crime drama, only I couldn’t be sure because I had only studied my Learn German in an Hour ebook for about five minutes, right up to the part where it said most Germans speak fluent English.
She put the remote under her and glared at Craig, as if to say, try and get it. He rolled his eyes and took out his phone, started fussing with it.
I cleared my throat, not quite sure what else to do.
She looked over the back of the couch at me. “That noise for me?”
“What? No. I just—"
“I’m not the entertainment, you know. Either pull up a seat and chill out or go unpack. That room over there is vacant. You might as well take it. There’s wifi in the apartment but Peter has rules against us giving it out. You’ll have to wait for him to arrive to get it from him. If you’re hungry there’s meats and cheese in the fridge. Make a sandwich or go to the deli on the corner and get a sausage or something. Beyond that stay quiet because I’m watching this.”
“You’re watching shit,” Craig said, fingering one of the cuts on his cheek.
Then something happened. Katrin sort of…changed. The look she gave Craig was so focused I swear I felt the hair on my arm stand up. Her eyes narrowed and her lips grew thin. Craig gulped and shook his head. “Stop looking at me,” he said, then stood up and went to a room off the living room, slammed his door and turned on his stereo loud enough to shake the walls. There was a screech a second later as he plugged in headphones (or so I assumed) and the apartment was quiet again.
I had no idea what that was all about and I wasn’t about to ask. If she was serious about Peter coming back in an hour, I’d just wait it out on my own, in my new room. Or I could go hail a cab and get a ride back to the airport, I figured. Peter hadn’t told me I’d be staying in the looney bin with these two nutjobs and I was already hearing that voice in my head that said I should run away. Not Skinny Man’s voice, thankfully, which had grown quiet these late few weeks, just that voice of reason that keeps us all alive. Call it your gut, call it intuition, it was warning me that living here was going to be hell on Earth.
I brought my stuff into the empty bedroom and sat on the bed. The room was bare, save for a painting of a church on the wall. Maybe it was a real church, maybe it was made up, I didn’t know. I scanned my phone for any messages from Peter or my patents but there was nothing. I’d sworn off social media after the episode with the cannibals in San Diego because I was getting too many weird messages from sickos getting off on my ordeal, so there was no one to engage with.
Except Tooth, who I swear I could hear somewhere in the room, chuckling. I knew it was just my screwed up mind playing tricks again, just like when I heard Skinny Man, but I wanted so bad to believe he was real and could hear me. I needed a real friend. “This place kind of sucks,” I said.
“Dude, Katrin is totally hot.” Tooth’s voice sounded like it was in front of me now. “Go talk to her. Maybe say something insulting so she sits on your face again. Most action you’ve seen in months.”
“She was trying to stab my taint. She doesn’t want to talk to me.”
“God you’re being such a pussy. She knew what she was doing, and I could tell when she saw your pathetic lightsabre at half-mast she was proud of herself. Girls like to know they can give you boner, man. Don’t you know anything.”
“I’m not going to talk to her. I’m not gonna talk to anyone until Peter gets here and tells me what the flying fuck this is all about.”
I could almost kind of see Tooth now, which happened when my mind was really working overtime. He leaned against the dresser and fussed with his hat. “Fine, be a wuss. You like it here, In Berlin. Remember those Nazi fucks we kicked the shit out of that time? Must be tons of ‘em here, right?”
“I don’t think Germany is like that anymore, Tooth. Seems to me they’re trying real hard to not be associated it with that stuff anymore. Everyone I’ve met is polite. Well, except for the two people in the other room, one of whom is clearly British and one of whom defended herself against a strange man in her apartment so I can’t blame her too much. ”
“You’re losing me.”
“I’m saying there’s no Nazis here. Let it go.”
“How can there not be? It was like, their grandfathers and shit.”
“And our grandfather’s made black people use separate bathrooms. And our great grandfathers kept them in cages and whipped them if they didn’t pick cotton. Times change, you know, and new generations do their best to atone for their ancestors’ atrocities.”
“Fine, there’s no Nazis. But you know what is here?
“Your dick cheese. Stinking up my new bedroom.”
“Well yes, but I’m talking about beer, you cumstain. You’re in the fucking motherland and I’m so jealous I wanna punch you in the head. Get off your ass and go ask Katrin to take you somewhere to get a German beer. Then, you get her good and drunk, bring her back here, and get some German pussy. C’mon, man, at least let me live vicariously through you. Go ask her.”
I unzipped my suitcase and rifled through it for my phone charger. “I’m not asking her. She clearly doesn’t like me and I do not want to get on her bad side.”
“Same old Roger. Still afraid of girls. Jesus.”
“Fuck you, Tooth. I’m not afraid of girls, or anyone else for that matter. I just don’t see the point of pissing off my roommate. You wanna date Katrin so bad, you go talk to her. I’m not asking her so let it go.”
There was a new voice behind me: “Who’re you talking to?”
I looked up, saw Katrin standing in the doorway to my room. She had the remote control in one hand and her soda in the other.
“No one,” I said, embarrassed that she’d caught me having one of my conversations with a dead person. “Just talking to myself.”
She looked me up and down, scanned the room, then took another step in and looked at all the walls. Like she could smell something but couldn’t place it. “Well tell your other self to keep it down and tell him I’m not in the mood for beer now. Peter called and said he’s coming to get you. He’ll be here in a couple minutes. Says you’re going out so grab a jacket and be ready.”
She turned and left the room. I could feel my jaw hanging open as I searched around for Tooth. His image was gone, as was his voice. I sat on the bed and stared blankly into the air before me.
How the hell had she known Tooth suggested I ask her to get a beer?
April 7, 2014
Hissers 2 oopsie
If you purchased Hissers 2 before April 2 please contact me so I can send you the correct book.
Correct book?! Yes, In my sleep-deprived haze of late, the company sent me the edited file to look over, which I did, and then sent back, only I attached the wrong file, which had the same name, and so the company thought all was well and produced it as a book. Well, lo and behold we've now learned that about 9,000 words are missing, and the typos that got corrected are still typos. This is woefully embarrassing and we want to make good on it so please contact me with your purchase receipt and we'll send you a free, correct version.
The only upside is that since the file was torrented not two days after it came out, I'll now be able to tell who downloaded it illegally when they complain about it in their reviews, to which I will send them a nasty email that smells like my socks.
(And yes, if you order it now you will get the proper book).
Thanks!
Correct book?! Yes, In my sleep-deprived haze of late, the company sent me the edited file to look over, which I did, and then sent back, only I attached the wrong file, which had the same name, and so the company thought all was well and produced it as a book. Well, lo and behold we've now learned that about 9,000 words are missing, and the typos that got corrected are still typos. This is woefully embarrassing and we want to make good on it so please contact me with your purchase receipt and we'll send you a free, correct version.
The only upside is that since the file was torrented not two days after it came out, I'll now be able to tell who downloaded it illegally when they complain about it in their reviews, to which I will send them a nasty email that smells like my socks.
(And yes, if you order it now you will get the proper book).
Thanks!
March 12, 2014
HISSERS 2 is out!
HISSERS 2: DEATH MARCH is now out in ebook format. Paperback will be out in a few days. (How apropos that I released this in March. I didn't even plan it.) This is the direct sequel to Hissers, and continues where the first book left off. Enjoy!
http://www.amazon.com/Hissers-II-Ryan...
http://www.amazon.com/Hissers-II-Ryan...
December 23, 2013
BUGBOY is out
Thunderstorm Books has done an awesome signed, limited edition hardback of a very old novel of mine called BUGBOY. Only 75 copies of this exist. All my books with them sell out fast so get it while it lasts. Thanks!
http://thunderstormbooks.com/thunders...
http://thunderstormbooks.com/thunders...
November 22, 2013
The Summer I Died movie fan page on Facebook
Hey all, I'd love you for life if you'd go and like the movie page. The director informed me they will be putting up promos and possibly even giveaways very soon:
https://www.facebook.com/Thesummeridi...
Thanks!
Ryan
https://www.facebook.com/Thesummeridi...
Thanks!
Ryan
November 18, 2013
The Summer I Died movie press release!
FILM ADAPTATION OF “THE SUMMER I DIED” FINDS ITS DIRECTOR AND STAR
LOS ANGELES, CA (11/18/13) – Riothouse Entertainment has closed a deal to acquire the film rights to the critically acclaimed novel “The Summer I Died” by Ryan C. Thomas with legendary actor Bill Moseley set to star in a leading role.
Visceral, intense and graphic “The Summer I Died” tells the story of Roger and Tooth: two lifelong friends who, while out on a day trip into the woods, find themselves at the mercy of a sadistic madman and his bloodthirsty dog when attempting to rescue a woman screaming for help.
Bill Moseley has signed on to play the demented killer only referred to as “Skinny Man” by the characters.
Eric Pereira, whose brutal true crime thriller “American Girls” is currently playing the festival circuit has signed on to direct from a screenplay by the book’s author Ryan. C. Thomas. Matthew Easton and David Lukan are producing.
The book, which has gained notoriety over the years as being one of the most violent and disturbing novels ever written, has found itself on numerous top 10 lists and has since amassed a significant cult following. The sequel “Born to Bleed” was released in 2011 with the third book in the trilogy being released this summer.
Further casting for the roles of Roger, Tooth and Jaime will begin in December with cameras to roll late February in New Hampshire and Los Angeles. The film is set for a late 2014 premiere.
LOS ANGELES, CA (11/18/13) – Riothouse Entertainment has closed a deal to acquire the film rights to the critically acclaimed novel “The Summer I Died” by Ryan C. Thomas with legendary actor Bill Moseley set to star in a leading role.
Visceral, intense and graphic “The Summer I Died” tells the story of Roger and Tooth: two lifelong friends who, while out on a day trip into the woods, find themselves at the mercy of a sadistic madman and his bloodthirsty dog when attempting to rescue a woman screaming for help.
Bill Moseley has signed on to play the demented killer only referred to as “Skinny Man” by the characters.
Eric Pereira, whose brutal true crime thriller “American Girls” is currently playing the festival circuit has signed on to direct from a screenplay by the book’s author Ryan. C. Thomas. Matthew Easton and David Lukan are producing.
The book, which has gained notoriety over the years as being one of the most violent and disturbing novels ever written, has found itself on numerous top 10 lists and has since amassed a significant cult following. The sequel “Born to Bleed” was released in 2011 with the third book in the trilogy being released this summer.
Further casting for the roles of Roger, Tooth and Jaime will begin in December with cameras to roll late February in New Hampshire and Los Angeles. The film is set for a late 2014 premiere.
November 10, 2013
New paperback version of The Summer I Died
There's is a new version on amazon but for some reason it doesn't come up in a search. I'm
trying to get them to fix it. For now here is the link. Thanks!
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/1492988...
trying to get them to fix it. For now here is the link. Thanks!
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/1492988...
