Curtis Edmonds's Blog, page 6

I Am The Kraken, And I Would Very Much Like To Go Home Now

I was told that the Supreme Court has declined to hear the most recent case involving the election. I have very little idea who or what the Supreme Court actually is, or why they were involved in all of this, or what an election actually is, to be honest with you. I would like to go back to the North Sea now.

I was asked to come here by some very nice people who told me that they needed my help. Most of my encounters with people over the last thousand years have been very negative, and have involved people on boats with long pointy spears. There have been a few nice and helpful zoologists and oceanographers over the years, but most of my interactions with people have been negative. I figured that this was a chance to do something positive, maybe rehabilitate my image somewhat.

When I was approached by the President’s legal team, I have to confess I was a little apprehensive at first. They told me that they had a strong case, based on statistical analysis and hard evidence of voter fraud. They said that my participation was important to protect the democratic process. I have friends in Iceland, and I know they have democracy there, but I didn’t know a lot about it. I figured that it was a great opportunity to learn. I was right about that, but not in the way I thought.

As a large underwater sea creature of high northern latitudes, I had not been paying very close attention to the Presidential election in your country. The only thing I really understand about elections is that someone wins and someone loses. It’s like that when I take on a school of plankton, although I always win. And the President was supposed to win, but someone took his plankton away from him and he was unhappy. Well, I understood that part, at least.

So I was told that I would be unleashed, and that once I was unleashed, the President would win. And it sounded like so much fun that I didn’t ask many questions that in retrospect I probably should have asked. For one thing, nobody told me that I would get unleashed in Atlanta. I have nothing personal against Atlanta, but I wish someone had told me that it was very far from the sea. I have spent all of my life in the cold waters of the far North, and Atlanta was far too warm and dry for my tastes. But everyone on the legal team said that what I was doing was very important, and that me being unleashed was the best for everyone. I still don’t know what being “unleashed” means; I’ve never been leashed in my life. But everyone said that it sounded cool.

I don’t want to sound impatient, but if all of this is really over, I would like to go home now.

Anyway, so I was told I was being unleashed in Georgia, and then in Michigan, and Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania. But every single time, the legal team kept losing. Nobody would tell me why. They’d say that I was doing a great job just being myself. Which didn’t make any sense to me. All I can be is myself; I’m never going to be a lawyer or handle a case in court.

It took me a long time to realize it, but I finally came to understand that all that the lawyers were doing with me was to use me to scare people. I didn’t like that at all. I honestly don’t want to scare people. I just want to go back to the Norwegian coast and dive into the inky blackness of the deep and feast on plankton and shrimp. Sure, every year or two I will sink an unlucky fishing trawler, but it’s usually because they sneak up on me and surprise me. It’s not something I set out to do. I know I have a scary reputation; that’s why I got involved in the first place, to show people that krakens aren’t really that scary. We just want to be left alone.

It’s important to me that people realize that I wasn’t ever trying to scare them. I was told the President was in trouble and I could help him. I mean, I never got to meet him because he was always golfing, but I thought I was doing the right thing.

I still don’t understand what I was supposed to be doing, or why it was important, or what a President even does. It’s all very confusing. I am sorry I got mixed up in this, and I would like very much to find a nice quiet fjord and sink to the bottom of it and contemplate things for a while.

I wish your country good luck with its new President and hope that his administration practices pro-kraken policies. Other than that, I’m through with public life and would very much like to go home now.

Overmorrow: Stories of Our Bright Future

I have a contribution to a brilliant new anthology of optimistic science fiction stories, which you should totally check out. My story is a sci-fi update of Dashiell Hammett, set aboard a sub-light colony ship. But there are several other good stories, it’s certainly worth your nickel.

A Few Minutes With The Housekeeper At My Hotel, Which Happens To Be On The Moon

No, it’s not that different here. A dirty toilet is still a dirty toilet. The design isn’t the same, of course, because we can’t waste water here, but they still have to be cleaned every day. It all goes out to the surface, did you know that? They showed us the waste treatment plant as part of the orientation. They expose it to vacuum, and that kills all the bugs, and then it gets turned into fertilizer.

The low gravity makes it a bit easier. The cart weighs a lot less, for one thing, and it isn’t anywhere near as hard to do all the stooping and bending that you have to do. But it works against you, too. When you change the sheets, you toss the top sheet over the bed, like so, and see? It can take forever to drift down. But you get used to it. You can get used to anything. That’s the lesson about living here.

I don’t have to clean windows, so that’s a plus. The original design had windows in every room, but they were concerned about pressure leaks and radiation. So they sealed up the rooms and put all the windows in the rooftop lounge. There’s radiation shielding up there; it’s not supposed to be any worse to work in there than it is to be an airline flight attendant, or so they say. All I know is that I don’t have to clean windows or futz around with curtains, so that’s something nice.

And of course there aren’t TV sets in here, so one less thing to dust. You brought your iPad, same as I did, so who needs to watch TV? TVs are big and heavy and expensive to ship up here, despite all the advances in rocket science. That’s why all the furniture in here is aluminum, because that’s something we can mine and manufacture right here. It’s a lot cheaper to do that than it is to bring up wooden furniture from Sweden or wherever. Maybe one day they’ll have trees growing here but I kind of doubt it.

Some people miss the trees. I don’t. I’m allergic to all that stuff. Before I came here I worked at a resort in the Bahamas, which was great, because palm trees don’t give off the same kind of pollen you get back home. And there was water everywhere you looked. I miss water. I mean, I miss having it cheap and available. I would give a lot to be able to go swimming, just for awhile, or even to take a long, hot shower. But all I have to do is wait two more years until I can leave. I can wait that long, I think.

It’s a five-year contract. The way it works, if you get picked, you spend six weeks doing training. How to work the airlocks, what to do if there’s an emergency, that kind of thing. Then they send you up on the rocket, and you stay here for five years. When they send you back home, they have to put you through six months of rehab. But it’s nice. It’s set up like a spa, and you get to eat pretty much whatever you want and get massages and spend your time working out to build up your strength. Once you’re cleared, you can get a transfer anywhere in the company where there’s a job open.

I need to get to the next room. If you want to follow me, you can, but I can’t stay here and talk all day. I have to finish this pod up before lunch, and then get to the next pod before I can get out of here.

They do the contracts for five years because they figured out that’s the most you can stay up here and still be able to function once you get home. If they rotate staff in and out of here any faster than that, they start to lose money. If you fall down and break your leg and they have to send you home, that’s a loss on the books. So they want you to stay for as long as you can because it costs so much to train your replacement and put them on the rocket.

You can make money here, though. Part of that is because there isn’t anything to buy, but the pay is good. I’m going to get out of here not owing any money on my college loans. I was at the University of Memphis, but I didn’t graduate. I was working on my degree in hotel management when my mom got sick. I dropped out, and I was able to support her and my little sister, but not make enough money to pay back the loans.

Once my contract is over, and I get paid, I am not coming back. Nobody wants to stay up here full-time, not even the scientists. Outside of them, we have three industries here; mining, manufacturing, and tourism. You don’t want to work in any of those jobs long-term if you can avoid it.

My friend Neil works here as a bartender. He has an economics degree, and he was telling me that the Moon is a Third World country. Did you know that? We’re like an island in the Caribbean. We import nearly everything and export raw materials, and then use the tourist trade to make the trade balance more even. Neil says there are exploitation colonies and settlement colonies, and this is an exploitation colony because nobody wants to settle here.

The problem with exploitation colonies is that everyone is trying to make money and nobody is trying to build a stable society or develop institutions. We don’t have anything close to an institution. There isn’t a government because nobody wants to stay up here long enough to run it. There aren’t any laws because they can’t pay people enough to come here and enforce them. So gambling is legal here, that, and prostitution.

They didn’t tell you about that? It’s true. Two of my suitemates are prostitutes. They’re nice people; they just got into debt back on Earth and this was the best way they had to get out of it. They work for the mining company. Technically, they’re support staff, but they don’t do anything but go over to the miners’ R&R compound — it’s the next set of pods over from here — and have sex with them three days a week.

The miners have it worse than anyone. They’re all single guys. A lot of them are Chinese who couldn’t get wives back home. They have to be single because they can’t have kids — you have to agree to get a vasectomy in that kind of job because of the radiation and the kind of long-term exposure you get from being on the surface all that time. They have the same five-year contract we have, and you can’t expect them to go without for five years. So they brought up women. Paula and Ashley — those are my suitemates — they make good money from the mining company, but they also freelance over here in the tourist area on their days off. It’s very lucrative, or so they say. I wouldn’t know.

Not that I don’t have sex or anything. I have a boyfriend. His name is Tom. He’s a sous-chef, and he works nights, so I hardly ever get to see him, but when we do get around to it, it’s something. Acrobatic, almost. You can do positions in the low gravity that you’d have to be a gymnast to do back home.

Look. This is my suitemate’s card. If you’re really that hard up, send her a text if you want. I’m not interested, thank you very much.

No, I don’t think you’re weird. I don’t blame you for being curious. It’s a new experience. The whole thing is weird, when you think about it, having sex on the moon. Think about it. Up until ten years ago, when they figured out how to build the advanced rockets, there had been just ten people on the moon, total, and they were dying off. I never thought I would make it to the Moon, and here I am. My sister’s kid thinks I’m some kind of hero, an astronaut or something. And maybe I am. But here I am, on the Moon, and here you are, on the Moon, and all either one of us is thinking about is sex. I think that’s amazing. We haven’t advanced all that much as people, or I don’t think so.

Sure, the sex here is great, but it’s not what you’d call romantic. It’s not a romantic place, the Moon. You’d think it would be, but it isn’t. It was my birthday last month, and Tom took me up to the rooftop lounge for dinner. I borrowed a dress from Paula, and all I could think about the whole time I was wearing it was how many times it had been wadded up on the same floors that I clean every day.

But it was a nice dinner. The whole time, we sat there, staring at the Earth. It’s beautiful. And you get to see it the way the astronauts saw it, the original explorers. We danced for awhile, and then Tom showed me some of the other stars. One of them he said was Jupiter, but I kind of had to take his word for it. He said that was where we’ll be going next, to the moons of Jupiter. I don’t know about that, but if we get there, not too long after, there’ll be somebody like me that has to clean up after them. I don’t know what that says about humanity, but to be honest with you, I think it’s kind of comforting. We need each other, even out here.

Originally posted at Untoward Magazine.

You Should Try At Least One Wasabi Peanut

Yeah, those little green balls, look like peanut M&Ms. But they’re not. I mean, they’re peanut, but they’re not chocolate. I don’t want to mislead you about that. They’re so not chocolate.

Wasabi. It’s Japanese. I mean, the peanuts are American – I think they’re American, I don’t know where else they grow peanuts. But the wasabi is Japanese. It’s like fusion or something.

I know you don’t like Japanese food, but this is really good. Besides, just because it’s Japanese doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try it, at least. Remember when I got you to try Sudoku? That was Japanese. And you play that every day.

I know Sudoku isn’t a type of food, I’m just making a comparison.

Wasabi? It’s not – it’s not anything really exotic. It’s just the Japanese word for horseradish.

Yeah, horseradish. Horseradish isn’t bad. You eat horseradish. Yes, you do. I’ve seen you. Cocktail sauce? What do you think is in cocktail sauce? Horseradish, that’s what. Look at the ingredients. You eat cocktail sauce, that’s not any worse than a delicious wasabi peanut.

I know you don’t like hot and spicy food. But it’s just horseradish. It’s not that spicy. It’s mild. It’ll just clean out your sinuses a little, that’s all.

I’m not saying to eat like six of them at a time. Because that would be abusive. I mean, yeah, there was that time I ate half a package watching the Steelers-Titans game, and you kept asking me why I was crying. That was the wasabi. But you can just try one; it won’t hurt you.

No. This is not at all like the time I got you to try that hot Vietnamese rooster sauce. That was a prank. And no, it wasn’t very nice. And I am sorry about that. I said so at the time. This is not anything like that. Or the time I got you to eat that dried pepper in my kung pao. I mean, it was funny. I know you didn’t think it was funny at the time, and you threw that egg roll at me, but we can look back on that now and laugh. Right?

Sweetie, I am not trying to get you to eat anything bad. It’s just one wasabi peanut. And they’re really good. The shell is really crunchy, and then you bite into it, and you get the peanut and the horseradish, and it’s a very strong, very complicated flavor.

Just try one.

You might like it. You don’t know.

I’m not saying dip it in Tabasco sauce and roll it in cayenne pepper. Just taste it. For me.

You just said a minute ago you wanted a snack.

Okay, that’s how you feel. I think there are some yogurt pretzels in the pantry. Nice, bland, safe tasteless yogurt pretzels. If you don’t want to try something new, that’s fine.

Come on. Just one.

Yankees Broadcaster Michael Kay Would Kindly Like You To Stop Overusing His Home Run Call

First thing I have to say, you know, is that I understand I really have nothing to complain about.  Being the announcer for the New York Yankees, I mean, how could you ask for a better job than that?  The history, the tradition, the pinstripes, the twenty-six world championships.  There’s nothing like being part of the greatest team of all time in professional sports.  And the people I’ve been privileged to know in the organization, from Mr. Steinbrenner all down, Mr. Cashman, all the great people at the YES Network, you could not ask for better, classier people to work with.  And now that we’ve moved across the street into the new House in the Bronx, it’s just that much better.  If you haven’t been there – and I know a lot of you haven’t been, yet – it’s just mind-blowing.  The concourses are so much wider.  The new steakhouse, which is just incredible, and the new Mohegan Sun sports bar.  And they’ve kept so much of what made the old Yankee Stadium such a great place, too.  It’s really a testament to Mr. Steinbrenner’s vision. 

What was I talking about?  Oh, yeah, the whole “See-ya!” thing.

I gotta tell you, I love making that call.  It’s the best part of my job.  Late innings, the Bombers are down, and Jeter or Damon or Posada come through in the clutch with a home run, well, there isn’t anything more exciting in sports than that.  And I get to punctuate that great moment by saying “See-ya!” over the YES Network, broadcasting to millions of Yankees fans in the tri-state Ford area – well, that’s an incredible feeling, I don’t mind telling you.

But even better than that is when I’m out on the streets of the City, and Yankees fans come up to me and say hello, and then when they say “See-ya!” when I’m walking away – well, that just gives me chills.  Because that means they’re out there, listening, and that means a lot to me.  And of course, they always want me to say “See-ya!” back to them, which of course I don’t do, because it’s kind of a strain on the old pipes to give out the home run call all the time.  That’s a little disappointing for them, and I recognize that.  But that’s not really the problem.

Let me kind of illustrate what I’m talking about.  The other day, the Bombers are in Baltimore, taking on the O’s, and it’s a day game, so I go out to a nice place in the Inner Harbor to get dinner.   And I’m there by myself.  Which is no big deal.  I usually go out with my YES Network broadcast partner, Ken Singleton, but of course he had a great career in Baltimore, and when we go back, it’s like Old Home Week for him, so he ended up going out with Boog Powell and some other old Orioles, and I wasn’t invited for some reason.  Same thing used to happen with Kitty up in Minnesota, so I’m kind of used to it.  Come to think of it, Cone does the same thing in Kansas City.  Anyway. 

So I went to this seafood place.  And the waiter comes over, and I ordered a Miller Lite and some chowder.  And he says, “See-ya later!”

First of all, it’s not “See-ya later!”  It’s just plain “See-ya!”  That’s irritating.  But I didn’t think it was meant in a mean way, so I shrugged it off.  He came back with the beer and the chowder, and it was Manhattan chowder, so I sent it back, because I can’t risk all that spicy tomato sauce somehow messing up the old instrument.  I had some really hot salsa once in Arlington, and my throat was so irritated I almost couldn’t finish the road trip, but that’s beside the point.  So I asked him to send it back, and he said sure, and then he said “See-ya!”  I sort of smiled at him, because at least this time he got it right. 

So he brought the right chowder back, and then he did it again with the “See-ya!”  Only this time, half the other waiters were watching him do it, and when he did, they all started cracking up.  That’s disrespectful, if you ask me.  I know there’s a lot of resentment of Yankees fans in Baltimore – after all, we outdraw them in their own stadium nearly every game – but there’s no need for that kind of treatment.

I finished my chowder, which wasn’t half bad – they had the oyster crackers and the saltines with it, which is nice, you usually just get one or the other.  And the waiter guy brings me my crab cakes, which are always great in Baltimore.  And I look up at him, and this time the entire wait staff is looking at him, and he does it again.  “See-ya!”  And everybody in the restaurant starts breaking out laughing.  And I don’t see why, because it isn’t funny or anything.  Well, eventually, the manager came over and apologized, and offered me a free dessert, which I had to turn down because I’m starting to maybe get a little tubby, you know. 

That’s the kind of thing that I’m talking about.  You see me out on the street, and greet me with a nice “See-ya!” – that’s a nice thing for me.  All I’m asking is that people not overuse it.  That, and come out and see the new House in the Bronx.  You’d be surprised at how affordable the tickets are – the sightlines in the upper deck over by the left-field foul pole are amazing.  Like I said, it’s a real testament to Mr. Steinbrenner’s vision.

Welcome to Flavortown!

Hi! My name is Joel, and I’ll be taking care of you during your visit to Flavortown. I hope you came hungry.

Here in Flavortown, we’ve got plenty of places to eat, and places to drink, and places to eat and drink at the same time. And they’re all awesome. I mean, we really shred it when it comes to food here in Flavortown. We don’t have much in the way of music or literature, mind you, but we’ve got everything else you’d want. The only thing we don’t have here is Baskin-Robbins. You know why? Because they only have thirty-one flavors, that’s why. That’s not how we roll in Flavortown, hoss.

We’re right in the center of town, at the corner of Chestnut Chili Ginger Lime Street, and Maple Cream Honey Caramel Boulevard. The Cilantro Corridor runs just north of here, and if you keep going you’ll hit the Herbal District, between Savory-Sage Street and Rosemary-Thyme Avenue. If you go the other direction, you’ll hit the Spice Center and Habanero Plaza. That can be kind of a rough neighborhood.

Our special today is the garlic-prune-ginger duck confit. That’s served with a little bit of truffle dust on top, and some tangerine zest, and a pine-nut and cucumber chutney, and you’ve got yourself what I think is a goddamned collision of savory and sweet.

What’ll you have to drink? Jamaican jerk mango iced tea? Pineapple melon tequila lemonade? Vanilla nutmeg hibiscus cola? We make our cola from cane sugar, you know. No high-fructose corn syrup in that sucker. If you want water, we have maraschino cherry water, infused with ground Sumatran pepper, or Thai-chili water with star anise and a slice of kiwi.

Look, I understand. This is your first trip to Flavortown. It can be a little overwhelming at times. I remember the first time I came here. I ordered a hot dog. They gave me a chicken Andouille sausage, marinated in ginger-soy sauce, on a sesame-caraway roll with Dijon mustard, celery salt, and a banana-pepper chipotle slaw. You want to talk about an intense experience, I mean, that was it. It was like zip-lining down a mountain with your hair on fire.

People say, oh, well, those guys over in Flavortown, they just jumble up a lot of different kinds of flavors together and don’t really care whether it tastes good or not. There’s a science to it, though. Take the bread here on the table. Okay, this is a sourdough rye bread with a cream-cheese raisin spread with a little bit of balsamic vinegar. The bread itself is fermented, so that gets you the umami going right there. There’s salt in the bread, too, and the crust is browned, so you get a little bit of caramelization. The rye is a little bit bitter, and the raisins in the spread even that out with more sweetness. And the vinegar gets you the sour component. Salty, sour, sweet, bitter, umami, and it all goddamned explodes in your mouth. That’s the Flavortown way.

Do you have any questions about the menu? Since this is your first time, you might want to try a burger. It’s the best way to customize your own personal flavor profile. Don’t order the bison burger, though, it’s overpriced for what you get. My recommendation would be the sriracha-horseradish mayo, on a sesame-rosemary bun with heirloom tomatoes. You know, something simple. That comes with hand-cut Cajun fries with saffron-curry ketchup.

I’m sorry. Really. I know. I’m talking too much. It’s just that I’m so enthusiastic about being here in Flavortown. I know we get a bad rap sometimes. The food critics have been awful. There was that place not too far from here–you know the one I’m talking about? Over in the Cobbler District. They were doing some amazing things with seafood desserts. They had this anchovy-mussel spread that they infused with lemon curd and served on pound cake. It was spectacular. But the critic didn’t order that. He got the vinegar-cured Chilean sea bass with blackberry-walnut crust, which wouldn’t have been too bad if they didn’t slather it with marshmallow fluff. Well, of course, if you’re going to take a big risk like that, you’re going to run into trouble. That place closed down, but we’re still here, and we’ve got a Parmesan-peppercorn grilled shrimp kabob with a blueberry-almond marinade. That’ll knock your goddamned eyes out.

You want the steak? Hot damn. We marinate that sucker in a strawberry-malt vinegar and cook it over artisanal charcoal sprinkled with Old Bay. Then we put a wasabi-Provolone crust with it, and serve it with the sautéed mushrooms with the paprika-mustard sauce. I mean, you came all the way to Flavortown, you might as well live it up a little, am I right? YOLO and all that good stuff.

No, we don’t have Heinz 57 sauce. That goes against everything we believe in Flavortown. The flavor profile is designed to bring out the real taste of the meat, not substitute it for some corporate version of spicy ketchup. No offense. The best thing I can do for you is to serve it without the crust–which I hate doing, you know–and maybe put a little glaze on it. Plum-hoisin, something like that, with a little Worcestershire to give you the similar kind of flavor. Does that sound OK?

And what do you want on your salad?

Ranch?

Seriously? You drive all the way out to Flavortown, and you ask for ranch dressing? What the hell is wrong with you?

Get out. Go back to your bland, boring life, and your inadequate palate. We don’t want your kind here in Flavortown.

Twenty-One

“That’s gross.”

“What’s gross?”

“What you’re doing to that poor sandwich.”

I’d opened a little can of sliced mushrooms and was arranging them on the bottom half of a long torpedo roll.

“That’s how it’s made,” I explained.

“That’s not how anything is made. That’s how something is ruined. Mushrooms don’t go with mayonnaise.”

“That’s not mayonnaise.”

“God, you’re right. What is that?”

“It’s what makes it good.”

“Please tell me you’re not putting cream cheese on a sandwich.”

“Ham and pastrami and Swiss with cream cheese and mushrooms.” I layered the cold cuts on top of the mushrooms and put on the cheese and the top of the roll.

“You’re going to eat that.”

“I’m going to toast it first. Do we have any chips?”

“I thought the pimento cheese thing was weird. But at least that had mayonnaise, you know, something that a normal person would put on a sandwich.”

I opened the door of the toaster oven. The sandwich would just fit. I set the dial for what I thought was two minutes. “I know it’s unusual, but this is a real thing. The sandwich place where I grew up had this—they called it the blackjack.”

“You would voluntarily order a sandwich that had cream cheese on it? Where did you grow up, anyway?”

“First of all, you know where I grew up; we were just there over Christmas. Second, if you went to the bagel place, they would make you a salmon sandwich with cream cheese if you asked for it. It’s not that uncommon.”

“You can put cream cheese on a bagel. That’s not the same thing.”

“They’re all carbohydrates. You never answered me about the chips.”

“Look on top of the paper towels in the pantry. There should be half a thing of those barbecue popped chips.”

I rooted around and found the chips, and grabbed a bottle of Shiner Bock from the case on the floor of the pantry. I put the warm beer in the fridge and got out a cold bottle, and transferred the chips and the beer to the table. When the alarm on the toaster oven dinged, I got the sandwich out and put it on a paper plate.

“Can you hand me a knife?” I asked.

“Sure.” She got a steak knife out of the drawer and handed it to me, hilt end first, the way you’re supposed to, and then went back to the microwave to get her soup.

I halved the sandwich, taking care not to cut the paper plate underneath. The cheese had just started to melt. A rogue mushroom slice had escaped off the back end, so I ate it while I waited for the sandwich to cool.

She walked over to the table, holding her soup bowl by the edges. “You are going to eat that, right? I understand if you don’t want it, but I’d hate to see you waste food.”

I took a bite because I didn’t want to answer her. The sandwich was still a little hot and I would have burned the top of my mouth if I hadn’t taken a quick swig of beer.

“At least it’s hot,” she said.

“Will you quit giving me grief about the sandwich?”

She looked contrite, but just a little.

“How is it, then?”

“It’s okay.”

“Just okay?”

“Yeah.”

“It’s not wonderful?”

“It’s a sandwich.”

“It’s the sandwich that you made, that you wanted, that you picked out over every other sandwich in the world. If you’re going to make a sandwich and put that much effort into it, it needs to be the best sandwich there is.”

“I guess.”

“Which that one is not, because it has cream cheese and canned mushrooms on it.”

“Stop it.”

“Sorry.”

“You want to know what the deal is?”

“I’m okay changing the subject at this point.”

“Here’s the thing. I haven’t had one of these in ten years, since I left Arlington. Living up here, if I want it, I have to make it. And it’s never as good. Whatever it is, whether it’s barbecue or Mexican food or you name it.”

“You moved up here, as I recall. Nobody made you.”

“It’s not that. I’m not complaining about moving. We live here now and that’s fine. Pizza’s better here, for one thing.”

“And the Chinese food.”

“Whatever. Here’s the thing. I don’t know that this is an actual blackjack sandwich.”

“I don’t get it.”

“I think I know how to make this. But it doesn’t taste right. It doesn’t taste the way it should, and I don’t know why. I know the cream cheese, and the mushrooms, and the ham, but I don’t remember if it was corned beef or pastrami. I don’t know if this is the right kind of bread. I never paid attention to how long they put it in the toaster, or anything. I just walked in the door and ordered a number twenty-one and that was all I had to do.”

“Oh, that explains it.”

“What?”

“Number twenty-one. Blackjack.”

“I never realized that.”

“Well, then. You learned something.”

“That just goes to show. I should have been paying more attention. I should have thought about what I was ordering so I could make it later if I needed to. I should have thought more about what I was doing.”

She ate a spoonful of soup. “It’s just a sandwich. It’s not that big of a deal. So it’s not the way you remember. Just enjoy it for what it is.”

“That’s not what bothers me.”

“So what bothers you?”

“What am I not paying enough attention to today that’s going to affect my life ten years from now?”

“Me.”

I looked up, and she was smiling that smile, the smile I had fallen in love with, the smile I hadn’t seen in weeks.

“You’re right,” I said.

“Of course I’m right. Finish your sandwich.”

Submission Guidelines for The Coconut Wheel: A Literary Exploration of Candy Crush Saga

Who are you?

We’re you. That is to say, we’re you if you’ve ever gotten stuck on Level 33 for a month. We’re you if you’ve ever run out of lives at three o’clock in the morning. We’re you if you’ve ever actively tried to play Candy Crush Saga while diapering a baby. We know. We understand. And we think there’s a literary dimension to what you’re going through.

What is your philosophy?

We believe literature is about desire and achievement. Candy Crush Saga is no different. Hemingway said the things we want are like cards. We know the things we want sometimes can be like having a blue candy drop in just the right place so you can use it to help swap out a color bomb with a striped candy. Desiring the things we want is the engine that drives the narrative forward to reach the summit of achievement. Our goal at The Coconut Wheel is to gather these stories, within the context of Candy Crush Saga, and present them to the world at large.

What are you looking for?

We’re primarily looking for short stories in the flash fiction range (about 1000-2000 words in length). We will be happy to consider longer pieces, assuming you have the necessary attention span to complete them. We will not consider novella-length pieces, as we no longer have the necessary attention span to read them.

What aren’t you interested in?

We are not actively seeking poetry, dream journals, or screenplays where Liam Neeson uses a particular set of skills to crush through a wall of meringues. We will not consider erotica because we personally think combining Candy Crush Saga with sex diminishes the pleasure involved. However, we will carefully consider slash fiction involving striped candies and wrapped candies.

What about non-fiction?

We are only looking for fiction at this point. We are not interested in non-fiction pieces, such as tips, tricks or strategy guides, unless you know something about Level 311 that we don’t already. We are also not interested in articles focusing on ways to pick up women using Candy Crush Saga, because that would be sexist and misogynist, and anyway it doesn’t work.

What themes are you focusing on?

There are many classic themes in literary fiction for talented writers to explore, such as the loss of innocence, the tension between man and his place in the natural world, and the conflict between the need for parental approval and the need to make one’s own way in the world. None of these things have anything to do with Candy Crush Saga. We are looking for themes related to addiction, conflicts with spouses who don’t play Candy Crush Saga and don’t understand why you just paid two dollars for a Lollipop Hammer, and addiction.

How do I submit my story?

The Coconut Wheel is one of the first literary journals to use Facebook for the submissions process. Just “like” us on Facebook and then send your story as a Facebook message. Oh, and please send us an extra life along with your story.

When will my story be published?

Right away. We’re not picky. If you send us the extra life, we’ll put it right up. We reserve the right to check for spelling errors, of course. And, like most small up-and-coming online literary journals devoted to casual gaming, we of course aren’t able to pay our contributors anything. But if you could just send us that extra life, that would be great. And three more moves, if you have them to spare.

This sounds sort of, you know, like a scheme to get free lives from strangers.

We’re just trying to share great literary stories related to Candy Crush Saga. The addictive nature of the game is not under our control. If you’re questioning our need for more lives, what you’re really doing is questioning the fundamental structure of the game. You’re questioning whether it’s right or wrong to intentionally set up a game which is so addictive and difficult that it requires the occasional financial contribution in order to play it properly. And that’s not a conversation we feel comfortable having. Just write us a story and send us those three moves and that extra life already. Thanks!

Q. Thornton, Undercover

I sat tailor-fashion on Bridget McIlhenney’s kitchen floor, my bare legs cold against the Mexican tile floor, sorting through her cabinets for anything that could pass for breakfast. I’d stacked the rejects over to one side – three jars of Paul Newman spaghetti sauce, a bottle of ten-year old balsamic vinegar, three tottering stacks of ramen noodles (shrimp, beef, and chicken, sorted by flavor), half a bottle of Malibu coconut rum, a jar of something that purported to be edible cactus leaves, and about nineteen cans of Beanie Weenies. (Did you know they made chipotle-style Beanie Weenies? And Dijon-mustard flavored? Honey-barbecue?) Bridget was a half-empty bag of Cool Ranch Doritos shy of being able to apply for a federal Superfund grant to clean up her nutritional toxic waste dump.

They told me at Battle Creek there’d be mornings like this.

I spotted a slightly-faded box of Minute Rice towards the back, which had potential, but I didn’t remember exactly how you got from dried instant rice to Rice Krispies. The alternative was to skip the most important meal of the day, or else embarrass myself by slinking over to Dunkin’ Donuts. (I knew a guy who’d been laughed off the force for just that.)

I had put everything away by the time Bridget walked in, wet with the autumn drizzle. She was wearing a headband, a gray spandex sports bra, and bright orange compression shorts that showed off every fast-twitch fiber of her lovely thighs – and she wasn’t even breathing hard after what must have been a five-mile run. She unhooked her iPod earphones, shot me a dazzling smile, and put the white paper bag she was carrying down on the table. “What are you looking for, sweetie?” she asked.

“Oh, nothing, sugar pop,” I said. “How was your run?”

“Okay. I got us breakfast.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. I figured, after last night, you’d need some carbohydrates.”

I pulled myself off the floor, walked over to where she was and gave her a slow, deep kiss, my hands firm against the slick skin of her back. I could have moved them down a few inches, and made us both late for work, but I saw the Einstein Brothers logo on the paper bag out of the corner of my eye, and disengaged.

“As much as I’d love to stay for breakfast, honey bunch, I need to head to the office.”

“Are you sure?” she asked. “I didn’t know what you wanted, so I got some different kinds. Sesame, and onion, and poppyseed.”

I repressed an inner shudder at the thought of poppyseed bagels – try explaining that one at the next drug test – and decided to press the issue. “Do you have any cereal?”

“There used to be some on the top shelf,” she said, “but I don’t think it’s there anymore.”

I knew there wasn’t, because that was the first place I looked – I had put a box of Cracklin’ Bran there myself, for just such an emergency. But all I found up there was an ample spice rack, a bottle of peach schnapps, and a pot of orange blossom honey.

“Are you sure you don’t want a bagel instead?” she asked. “I can toast one up for you.”

“Did you eat the cereal, or toss it out? Or maybe you just moved it?”

“I don’t know. I don’t remember. What are you, anyway, the cereal police?”

The first day of undercover training, they tell you how to handle exactly this situation. “The cereal police,” you’re supposed to say. “Yeah, right. The cereal police. Like they really exist.” Then you’re supposed to change the subject to baseball. “What do you think the Tigers are going to do in free agency?” Simple. Anybody can do it.

I didn’t. I just stood there, looking blank, and guilty.

Her eyes widened, and she pointed an accusing finger at me. “You are the cereal police. And you were spying on me, going through my cabinets.”

I couldn’t manage anything other than a half-hearted well and a hesitant uh. Spying on people and going through their kitchens is my basic job description, anyway. When it happens – when people get caught without any cereal in the house – they usually turn defiant, or melt into a puddle of fear and self-recrimination. I just looked at her, waiting on her to decide how she was going to respond.

And she melted.

“Oh, God, I’m going to jail,” she whispered. “I’m not going to be able to finish my screenplay.”

“Bridget…”

“And they don’t let you run in jail, right? You just pace around the exercise yard and lift weights, and…”

I took her hands, and steered her over to a chair in the breakfast nook, and waited for her to stop hyperventilating. “Look, Bridget, people have the cereal police all wrong. We don’t put people in jail.” At least not all that often, I didn’t say. “Ninety percent of what I do is give out citations to thirty-year-old fat guys who are still eating Crunchberries, mostly to get them to mix in a little fiber, cut down on the sugar. We’re not going after people who are obviously physically fit, like you are.”

“You’re sure?”

“Honest to God. Like I said, I was just looking for that Cracklin’ Bran.”

“I ate it,” she said, her body quivering with relief. “I put it on my ice cream. My sister puts bran cereal on her ice cream, something to do with the glycemic index. I tried it, and it wasn’t too bad. Granola would have been better, though.”

“Okay. We’ll get you some granola, that’s fine. Don’t worry about anything.” And then I lowered my face to hers and kissed her, and we ended up being late for work after all.

When it was over, and we were getting dressed, she asked me what my real name was, and I told her. “It’s Quincy. Quincy Thornton.”

“Really?” she asked. “I promise I won’t tell anyone.”

“Really,” I said, and I knew she wouldn’t. “But my friends call me Quisp.”

Punch List

Thank you for the opportunity to look around your home and inspect it for possible defects. I appreciate being of service in this matter, and have attached a brief checklist of items that may cause possible problems.

Kitchen

I spotted some loose trim near the dishwasher, which can be nailed down easily. You also need to think about vacuuming the coils on the back of the refrigerator, which can help with energy efficiency. I checked inside and noticed what appeared to be a small interdimensional portal, although it wasn’t there when I looked again later. You might want to check your warranty and see if it covers that.

Library

I was quite impressed by the size and scope of the books you have collected. I have no idea if they are valuable or not, but they do represent a significant fire hazard and you might want to invest in a fire-suppression system for this room. The bookstand with the open copy of The Necronomicon is a nice touch, but leaving the book open like that can generate ghastly noises of eldritch horror. I can recommend some soundproofing solutions that may alleviate that somewhat.

Bedroom

As you probably already knew, there are quite a few nail pops in the ceiling, which is normal in a house this old. Additionally, the lighting leaves something to be desired. One easy solution is to install some battery-powered LED lamps over the portraits; they last for 10,000 hours and provide just enough ambient light to overcome some of the gloom in there. And I don’t mind telling you, it’s just creepy enough in there that it seems that the eyes in the portraits are following you. I’m sure it’s an optical illusion.

Conservatory

This is more of an organization thing than anything else, but you might want to clean up the clutter in there a bit—I saw a wrench, a lead pipe, rope, and a revolver in there, just lying around. The candlestick looks nice, but everything else should probably be stored more safely.

Jungle Room

You probably already know this, but the big problem here is the humidity—it’s the perfect conditions for growing mold. I know you need it moist in there for all the plants, but I would recommend removing the wallpaper and repainting with a mold-resistant paint. You also need to make sure that the lid on the terrarium is tight enough so that the python can’t escape. There is just one python in that room, right?

Dungeon

The chains that you have in there right now are attached to the wall with drywall screws. There’s a good chance that your captives will be able to pull those right out. You need to make sure that the chains are bolted into the studs. I can send you a YouTube video that shows you how to do it if you want.

Laboratory

It looks like you’ve invested a lot of money on some very expensive equipment, but I’m concerned that the wiring isn’t adequate to support all the amperage you’re drawing down. At a minimum, I would shell out for a surge protector for the corpse reanimation system.

Wine Cellar

The masonry in this room is very nicely done, but there appears to be a very narrow niche in the east wall, just big enough for a person to get trapped in there. You ought to look in to getting that bricked up.