Super!!Stories!!

Independence Day

frankbyrns@hotmail.com — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 23:50:46 GMT

So my Thousand Faces email addresses have been out there on the world wide interweb for a while now, so I tend to get a lot of spam every day. And, of course, some (much) of the spam is of the, ahem, adult variety.

But at least they're seasonal. Today I was invited to visit "Stars and Strippers Forever."

God Bless America.

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Brickhouse

frankbyrns@hotmail.com — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 03:16:20 GMT

Received my two contributor copies today of Trail of Indiscretion #9, which contains my short story "Brickhouse". TOI is a good looking small press magazine, with some interesting stories (and comics!). Ran across these guys last year at the Baltimore Comic Con, and submitted something their way. Readers of Requiem will recognize "Brickhouse", of course, which is one of my favorite pieces that I've written.
Always fun to hold a copy of a magazine with something that you've written inside. It's a feeling that never gets old.

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Fiction Lineup for Issue #5

frankbyrns@hotmail.com — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 04:00:34 GMT

Since we're on the topic of the July issue:

Mister Brass and the Dragons of Mars, by Joshua Reynolds
Hunted, by Andrew Salmon
Burn Boy, by Natasha J. Stillman
Crank Case, by Jeff Parrish
Matchstick, by Michael Obilade
School Days, by James Mascia
Chaos and Hope, by Gary J. Beharry
Enter Hubert, by Elizabeth Bennett Porco
Hero in the Big City, by EK Rivera


Some good stuff there - I think folks will really like Mister Brass.  
There's another story featuring him coming up in the next issue, as well.  

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Cool Interviews

frankbyrns@hotmail.com — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 03:41:13 GMT

Working on a couple of fun interviews for next month's issue of A Thousand Faces.

I am talking to David Schwartz, the author of new superhero novel Superpowers. I'm about halfway through the book right now -- pretty good so far. It deals with a group of five college friends who wake up one morning with assorted (you guessed it) superpowers, and deals with the "Now, what?" question.

I am also talking with Owen King and John McNally, co-editors of a new superhero fiction anthology, Who Can Save Us Now?, due in stores in mid-July. I haven't gotten my hands on a copy yet, but they namedrop Fortress of Solitude and Kavalier and Clay (two of my favorite books, by the way) in the introduction, which may give you an idea of the feel of these stories.

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Order of Valor update

frankbyrns@hotmail.com — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 18:58:52 GMT

Has it really been over a month since I posted last? Yeesh. I guess not having internet access at home (virus problems) really crimps productivity.

The third issue of The Order of Valor is now complete, over at Drunkduck -- check it out from the beginning HERE, and know that we're just getting started with our time-traveling Viking Horde.

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A Thousand Faces #4 is live!!

frankbyrns@hotmail.com — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 19:22:02 GMT

Been a crazy month of April around here - partly because of the work I've been putting in on the Spring 2008 issue of A Thousand Faces, the Quarterly Journal of Superhuman Fiction.

I think it's our best issue yet; check it out HERE and let me know if you agree.

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Now Reading....

frankbyrns@hotmail.com — Fri, 04 Apr 2008 01:21:22 GMT

Reading the new Richard Price novel, Lush Life. It's not a whodunit, or even a whydunit -- there's a murder, and you know pretty quickly who did it, and then watch it ripple through a NYC neighborhood. I like it -- his best since Clockers, I think, maybe better than that.

            "What am I supposed to tell myself," Billy hissed in his ear, "it was his time? He was summoned? It was for
            his own good? He's better off now? He's romping in some, some cloud meadow? He was sacrificed to prevent
            some great evil from happening?

            "OK, look -- " Matty began.

            "And my son isn't watching over me. He doesn't live on in my heart. He doesn't talk to me. I talk to me and
             what I say to myself -- "

            "OK, hang on, stop."

            "Cherish your memories . . . My memories feel like knives and I would gladly burn them out of -- "

            "Just stop."

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Today's the day. . .

frankbyrns@hotmail.com — Mon, 31 Mar 2008 12:07:53 GMT

It's OPENING DAY!!!

Who cares what I have to say?

frankbyrns@hotmail.com — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 00:42:42 GMT

There's an interview with me up at Comic Bits Online -- check it out HERE.

We talk about Requiem and A Thousand Faces, among the usual topics.

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A little something I liked....

frankbyrns@hotmail.com — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 03:17:49 GMT

"And when the men kissed the women good night, and their weekend whiskers scratched the women's cheeks, the women did not think shave, they thought: stay."

-- Amy Hempel, "Weekend"

Hollow - Best of 2007

frankbyrns@hotmail.com — Wed, 27 Feb 2008 12:32:13 GMT

My story "Hollow", originally published in Aphelion back in February of 2007, was chosen by readers and editors of that magazine as one of their fifteen Best Short Stories of 2007.

Unfortunately, I hadn't checked their site lately, and this just came to my attention this week, despite having been announced earlier this month. C'est la vie.

"Hollow" is the fifth story I have published in the pages of Aphelion -- great magazine, always worth a look.

You can read (or re-read -- your mileage may vary) "Hollow" HERE. Superheroes, TS Eliot, Cancer. . . you won't be disappointed.

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"Illustrated" Requiem

frankbyrns@hotmail.com — Sat, 23 Feb 2008 21:32:34 GMT

Joe and I just finished up a fun, three part "illustrated" version of "Requiem", the titular story in my most recent fiction collection. We ran it on the Order webpage as a bit of a filler between Issues #2 and #3. You can check it out here -- it's always fun to see your stories come to life. I particularly liked the illustration for part 2 of the story, as Byron visits the Talley family with some bad news.

You can check it out HERE.
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The Order - Issue #2 is complete!

frankbyrns@hotmail.com — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 20:35:11 GMT

The second issue of The Order is now completed over at Drunk Duck -- check it out HERE.

Plenty of good stuff in this issue -- Giant gorillas! Sentient computer viruses! Even a little old-fashioned romance!

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A Thousand Faces #3!!

frankbyrns@hotmail.com — Wed, 30 Jan 2008 01:00:07 GMT

The winter 2008 issue of A Thousand Faces is LIVE.

Biggest issue yet -- interviews with Van Allen Plexico and Christopher Knowles, and the usual assortment of great fiction.

I would particularly recommend Steve Goble's "The Bigger They Are" and Robichaud & Glencer's "Making Time."

Check it out!

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Issue #2 -- First five pages

frankbyrns@hotmail.com — Sat, 12 Jan 2008 21:01:36 GMT

Another good week for The Order of Valor: the first five pages of Issue #2 , "Hello, Mother. . ." , are finished and available HERE.

I'm still keeping reasonably ahead (after all, I'm only writing; Joe's penciling, inking, coloring, and lettering!), having just finished the script for Issue #4, the second chapter of a three part Time-Traveling Viking Horde saga!

I think you'll like it.

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#3 with a Bullet!

frankbyrns@hotmail.com — Thu, 03 Jan 2008 18:15:41 GMT

Well, you can't say a little promotion doesn't help: after a day and a half as the top featured book on Drunk Duck's main site, The Order of Valor is now the #31 book overall, and the #3 superhero book in total readership, despite having only a fraction of those other books total page counts.

The #1 book is, of course, the gold standard of superhero webcomics, DJ Coffman's awesome Hero By Night.

JANUARY 6th UPDATE: Now five days into our front page exposure, we are the #2 superhero book, and #18 book overall, and still getting more hits in a day than we got in a month previously. Ah, the power of exposure. Just goes to show that it doesn't matter how good something is, if no one knows it's there, no one will read it.

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The Order: Featured Comic!

frankbyrns@hotmail.com — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 16:39:14 GMT

The Order is the featured comic today over at Drunk Duck -- check out the blurb HERE.

I don't know the usual surfing time for most webcomic readers, but it's not even lunch and we've already had over 10 times our usual visitors.

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Favorite Graphic Novels of 2007

frankbyrns@hotmail.com — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 02:57:39 GMT

And another list. Again, in no particular order, my ten favorite graphic novels that I read in 2007:

* The Nightly News
* Powers: Cosmic
* Laika
* The Hood: Blood From a Stone
* Elk's Run
* The American Way
* Rock Bottom
* Ex Machina: Smoke Smoke / Ex Machina: Power Down
* Meltdown
* Gotham Central: Quick and the Dead / Gotham Central: Dead Robin

And special mention for Ed Brubaker's books, the only ones I still pick up monthly: Daredevil, Captain America, and Criminal.

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Favorite Novels of 2007

frankbyrns@hotmail.com — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 02:47:21 GMT

Everybody else is doing "best of" lists, so here's mine:
In no particular order, my five favorite novels (not necessarily the best, but my favorite) that I read in 2007:

The Road, Cormac McCarthy -- bleak, apocalyptic, masterful. I still can't quite believe it was an Oprah book, but whatever. A very visceral read for a father to be with a son on the way (as I was when I read it). Heartbreaking.

Fortunate Son, Walter Mosley -- a modern parable that reads very much like a fairy tale (in a weird way). I dare you to read it and not examine your own views on race in today's America. Powerful stuff.

Star Wars: Allegiance, Timothy Zahn -- the master of the Star Wars novel returns with another good one, set this time between A New Hope and Empire Strikes Back, detailing a platoon of stormtroopers from the fearsome 501st.

Bust, Ken Bruen & Jason Starr -- the best of the excellent Hard Case Crime series that I read this year. Hilarious, violent, thrilling -- it's like a postmodern Elmore Leonard.

Patriot Acts, Greg Rucka -- the latest Atticus Kodiak novel (after a long break), this was one of my most anticipated books in '07 and it did not disappoint. It is criminal that Rucka doesn't have permanent residency on the best-seller list.

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2007 Reading List

frankbyrns@hotmail.com — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 02:28:10 GMT

Happy New Year!

Final tally for my 2007 reading: 35 books, 103 graphic novels. A bit short on my book goal, a bit over on the GN goal, so we'll call it a wash and a successful reading year. (2006 saw 43 books and 108 GNs, but we had a kid in October of this year, so what do you want?)

Observations:

* Of my 35 books, 9 of them were Star Wars titles (and 8 comics, as well). The Legacy of the Force series made up most of those (7), a series that started out at as interesting, almost sympathetic look at the evolution of a Sith Lord, but later became your stock evil villain, a disappointing turn.

* I was really pleased to see that 15 of the books and 14 of the GNs came courtesy of the Howard County Public Library System, which was a big improvement in our banking account.

* 8 of the books were non-fiction, easily the highest number that I've read since I started keeping track a few years ago.

* I also finally read Phillip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy, just in time to find out that the first movie gutted everything that made the books interesting. A pity, really. My wife's mostly mad that it took me so long to read them that she can't remember the specific details necessary to really, really discuss it. She read them 6-7 years ago, and has been after me to read them ever since. My fault -- really good stuff, after all.

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ComicSpace

frankbyrns@hotmail.com — Sat, 29 Dec 2007 17:23:08 GMT

FINALLY updated my ComicSpace profile. If anybody else is a member, friend me!

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The Order #1 -- Complete!!

frankbyrns@hotmail.com — Thu, 27 Dec 2007 03:34:41 GMT

The first issue of The Order, created by artist Joe Jarin and myself, is now complete over at Drunk Duck.

You can check out the final few pages HERE, or read it from the beginning HERE.

Silver Age fun, Digital Age format. (Still working on a tagline.)

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Influence

frankbyrns@hotmail.com — Sat, 22 Dec 2007 19:02:11 GMT

Anybody else find their writing influenced by what they're reading / watching on TV? The obvious answer is yes, of course so, but I guess I'm more curious as to how your reading / viewing affects your writing.

For example: I've been watching The Shield a lot lately. I know, I know, I'm only about six years behind, but I never watched it when it was airing on FX, and only recently started picking up the DVDs at the library. I have one more disc to finish off Season Three, and so far, I'm really enjoying it.

So, of course, last night on the train ride home from work, I cooked up a story with some strong street gang elements to it. It would have several of my "street level" hero characters working together (A Team-Up!! Haven't done one of those yet.) when gang factions in their respective neighborhoods go to war with one another. We'd see Silversword, El Torero, Adonis, Jack Sampson, I think, with plenty of other cameos. It would also provide a look into the criminal structure of Jefferson Falls. A lot of racial politics, that sort of thing.

I'm also reading Tulia at the moment, a (nonfiction) book dealing with dirty cops and the broken system with which we fight the war on drugs, with heavy emphasis on some of the racial elements therein. Similar to The Shield in some regards (racial issues, crooked cops, drugs, gangs), and a good read as I get ready for the final season of The Wire.

So is there any wonder I had that story idea last night?

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Harvey -- Part 3

frankbyrns@hotmail.com — Fri, 21 Dec 2007 03:40:35 GMT

The conclusion of "Harvey", behind the cut.

* * *

Harvey’s words haunted me all night. Be careful it doesn’t happen to you. Be careful what doesn’t happen to me? Which part? The mental powers? The drinking? The madness?

I didn’t sleep a wink, tossing and turning all night, terrified. And right after school the next day – a school day elongated by a detention period as a reward for falling asleep in Civics class – I pedaled over to Dell’s for an explanation.

“He ain’t here, Cliff,” Dell said. “Didn’t show up this morning. Do me a favor, though, if you do find him – tell him don’t bother coming back.”

Being more concerned for Harvey’s well-being than for his job security, I turned and left the barber shop without a word. Without even thinking about it, I found myself on Logan Street, heading back towards Harvey’s trailer.

My mind wandered as I raced across town. Doctor Utopia had been a member in good standing of The Order for years. If Harvey truly was who he said he was – and after the conversation of the previous afternoon, I had no doubt that he was – how could the world’s greatest array of heroes let this happen to one of their own? The Seven Pillars of Freedom would never turn their back on one of their staunchest members – would they? Could they possibly have left him out here alone, the act of drinking himself to death the only weapon left for him to fight the creeping insanity?

I banged on Harvey’s door, no longer worried about tetanus, just Harvey. There was no answer, so I banged again, this time with both fists. Still no answer. “Harvey?”

I stepped off the small porch and walked around to the back of the trailer, standing under a small window that I guessed to be near the bed inside the trailer. “Harvey – it’s Cliff. Wanted to ask you about something you said yesterday.”

I picked up an empty Bourbon bottle and flung it angrily into a neighbor’s yard. Why was he ignoring me? How could he say what he said to me and then ignore me. Be careful it doesn’t happen to you. Asshole.

I went back around front to the door, as determined as I had ever been about anything in my short life. I was going to get my answer. Without even bothering to knock, I walked right into Harvey’s trailer.

“Harvey!” I called, spying his bare feet sticking out from where he lay on the floor behind the bed. “Wake up, you old drunk – we have to talk.”

I looked around the small trailer, old issues of Life and TV Guide and Weird Tales stacked haphazardly all over the place. There was a black steamer trunk at the end of Harvey’s bed, the lid standing open, a heavy padlock open on the floor near Harvey’s feet. I walked over to Harvey and poked one of his feet with the toe of my Chuck Taylor’s. “Harvey,” I said angrily, starting to understand why Dell hated him so much.

I leaned over the edge of the bed to get a better look at Harvey’s face – his eyes were wide open, glassy, unnaturally still. I shuddered involuntarily, choking the terror back down into the pit of my stomach. I watched his chest, the way I’d seen them do it in the movies, waiting for movement, the telltale rise and fall. Nothing.

Harvey was dead.

I took a clumsy step backwards, stumbling over the open trunk as I did so. When I regained my balance, I found myself looking down, directly at Harvey’s most prized possessions.

A green mask, a matching cape with black trim. His Order of Heroes signal ring, which allowed the bearer access to The Citadel, the most exclusive clubhouse on Earth. A letter of commendation, signed by President Eisenhower. A dog-eared photograph of a much younger Harvey in happier times, walking hand in hand down the sidewalk with a beautiful woman who looked a lot like The Nightingale would look if she wasn’t wearing her mask.

Without even thinking, I unshouldered my book bag, unzipped it, and began stuffing Harvey’s things inside, right next to my Civics textbook. The mask, the cape, the letter, the photo, all of it. And when the trunk was empty, I ran outside to my bike.

I biked back downtown with Harvey’s whole life in my book bag. The more I thought about things, the faster I rode, angrier and angrier with each turn of the pedals. This town never knew what they had.

Now that they would know the truth, they would want to do something special. To honor Harvey. A parade, maybe, some stupid speeches down at the American Legion Hall. I pictured the mayor behind the podium, handing some cheap medal to some long-lost third cousin, the closest relative of Harvey’s they could find. Dell in the front row with my dad, the two of them beaming with pride. It made me sick.

Harvey never deserved their ridicule; they didn’t deserve his memory.

I wished that there was something I could do to deny them that. Something to stop a sick joke like that from happening. I wished that they could all just forget they had ever met Harvey. I closed my eyes, and wished that they could forget about him completely.

And they did.

* * *

It was the greatest feat Doctor Utopia had ever performed. One by one, he got inside the minds of the Galactic Swarm. One by one, he convinced them that they had never heard of Earth. It took a mighty effort, and the hero was never the same afterwards, due to the strain, but one by one, he erased our existence from their thoughts and memories. And then, as suddenly as they appeared, they were gone. And the sun shone once more.

* * *

Well, that’s enough writing for today. My hand’s starting to cramp up, and besides, it’s getting late. Almost time to go to work.

A siren wails as a squad car passes by my empty apartment window, several stories below. Trouble has started early tonight.

I reach into my closet for the familiar green mask, wondering why anyone would want to read my memoirs. The mask is as comfortable as ever as I slip it over my eyes. His mask. Doctor Utopia’s mask.

Times have changed, I guess. The public’s appetite for heroes and capes and masks has never been stronger. We’re just another piece of a 24 hour news cycle, celebrity-obsessed culture. It’s not like it was in his time, days of shadows and intrigue. The era of the mystery men is over. Nobody wants a mystery now – everybody just wants to know everything.

They want me to tell all, tell everything, but when Harvey tried to tell anything, they wouldn’t listen.

I told myself when I started this that this book was only complete if Harvey’s story was a part of it. So when I talked about the debilitating headaches I sometimes get, the ones that put me down for days, people would know why. So when I talked about turning down all those invitations to join The Order, people would know why. So when I talked about honoring the legacy of Doctor Utopia by wearing his mask and colors, people would know why.

My life is your story, Harvey.

Thank you.

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Harvey -- Part 2

frankbyrns@hotmail.com — Wed, 19 Dec 2007 03:34:39 GMT

Second of three parts of my new story "Harvey", behind the cut.

* * *

I was out of my church clothes before dinner on Sunday, and on my bike before 1:30. Teddy’s mom worked down at the courthouse, and she had found Harvey’s address for us, out in the trailer park on the edge of town. Teddy had told her that Harvey had left his jacket at the shop, and he wanted to return it so that the old man wouldn’t get cold. Teddy’s mom knew Harvey didn’t have much, and thought it sweet of her son. There was no jacket, of course – we just wanted to hear the end of the story.

We met up at the school as planned, then pedaled down Logan Street to the northern edge of town. We took a right into the Peaceful Valley Trailer Park, then the next left to the last trailer on the right. There were nicer parts of town, as my mother often said. But even among the disrepair of the neighboring trailers, Harvey’s place stood out. The grass hadn’t been cut in months. The rubber dumpster in the side yard was overflowing – it looked like Harvey didn’t use trash bags. The sides of his Gulfstream were patched and rusty, and it seemed like you could punch right through the wall into his bedroom. I was almost afraid to knock. I had learned about the dangers of rusty metal from a Hardy Boys novel, and wanted no part of tetanus.

“Betcha we could catch a couple of snakes in there,” Teddy said, motioning with his head towards a particularly tall patch of Harvey’s front yard. We called Teddy “The Nature Boy”, for the obvious reasons. He only wore shoes to school and church. I knew his lack of shoes wouldn’t keep him out of that grass.

“You might could find a dead body in there,” I said in an effort to keep him out. Teddy gave me a sideways look, wondering if I knew something he didn’t. I think he decided that I might, and stayed on the sidewalk. I toed down my bike’s kickstand and walked up the walk to the door to Harvey’s trailer. Hoping against lockjaw, I reached up and knocked.

No answer. I found that strange. It was Sunday – Dell was closed. Everything uptown was closed, except for the matinee show at the Palladium. Where could Harvey be? He had to be at home. I knocked again.

“C’mon, man, he’s not here,” Teddy said, mounting back up. “Let’s go fishing.”

I ignored my friend, and knocked again. “Look,” Teddy tried again. “Even if he is here, I don’t think he wants to be bothered.”

The small trailer rocked slightly from side to side as someone stirred inside, proving my point. “Get the hell outta here.” Harvey’s voice rumbled from inside, the words spoken in a deep slur, proving Teddy’s point.

Teddy grabbed my elbow, his eyes wide, pleading.

“Hey, Harvey,” I called out, jerking my arm free. “We were hoping you could finish that story from yesterday.”

More movement inside the trailer. I leaned forward, pressing my face against the dirty screen door, trying to peer into the darkness inside, seeing nothing. I took a step back and turned around just in time to see Teddy pedaling off towards the pond – a move that probably saved me a broken neck, as the trailer’s screen door came flying open.

I thought I knew drunk. My father came home from the office Christmas party a few years before in a really good mood, singing carols in a ridiculously deep voice, my mom giggling beside him, before he fell asleep on the couch, still wearing his dress shoes. I sat quietly at the kitchen table with my grandfather and watched as he drained an entire bottle of Bourbon two days after my grandmother died, neither of us saying a word the entire afternoon. So I thought I had seen a drunk, but when Harvey answered the door, it was something else entirely.

Harvey stood in the trailer’s open doorway, matted raggedly by the darkness inside. His thin, gray hair was a wild, unkempt mess that matched the bristly white stubble that grew in rough, irregular patches on his face and neck. He was wearing a stained, tattered baby blue bathrobe, open at the waist over a threadbare pair of white cotton boxers, and nothing else. He held a nearly empty bottle of Kentucky bourbon by the neck in one hand, and a splintered wooden spoon in the other.

But compared to the wild, vacant look in his eyes, his physical appearance was almost civilized. He squinted at me for a long moment. I was afraid that he wouldn’t recognize me. “What do you want, kid?” he said finally.

My mouth stalled, as a multitude of options raced through my mind. “I was hoping you would finish that story,” I said, choosing the only one of thousands that didn’t involve running away in fear.

Harvey tilted his head to the right, his vacant eyes sizing me up. It made me very uncomfortable. When he spoke again, his voice was quiet but firm, barely above a whisper. “Let me make this as clear as I can, son. No.” His sentence was half over before I even realized that his lips were not moving.

Is he in my head? I wondered, alarmed.

Yes. Harvey’s voice was a dull echo that I felt, rather than heard. It seemed to be coming from somewhere near the back of my neck. No one wants to hear the end of that story. Dell and your father made that clear.

Despite the overwhelming physical evidence presented to the contrary, the apparent telepathy left me with no doubt that Harvey had once been the great hero of his stories. Did the booze do this to him? Is that the reason that the name Doctor Utopia hadn’t been heard in years, except in dusty old newspaper archives and half-baked barbershop ramblings? Why would a man on top of the world do that to himself?

“Why?” Harvey asked, using his voice this time. After the soft mind’s echo of his previous words, his question seemed impossibly loud. “I’ve had this gift my whole life.” Spittle flew as he forced out the “G” in gift.

“And the older I got, the more in tune with it I got,” he continued. “I got better at pinpointing particular voices, better at listening. And the more I listened, the more I could hear.”

Harvey paused just long enough the drain the last of the bourbon, then continued. “You know, at first it was only the people in the same room. All of their thoughts, all at once, like my own private dinner party. Then, it was anybody in the same building, then out on the sidewalk. Then I pushed it out far enough that I could read every voice in the entire block, all at once, none of them paying any attention to the other. It was overwhelming.”

Harvey paused again, and his eyes suddenly regained their clarity; a rich hazel, in the throes of thought. “It was like tossing a rock into a puddle. Making circles, each circle bigger than the last. But the circles never stopped – it was like the rock never hit the bottom. They just got bigger, and bigger, and bigger. And now?”

Harvey closed his eyes softly, projecting this last bit right into my skull. Now, kid, now I can hear them all.

“No, I’m not crazy,” he said aloud, reading my thoughts. “I wish I was.” He pointed at the trailer next to his. “The woman over there? She wants to kill her husband – right now she’s wondering if the poison she saw last night on The Rockford Files would do the trick, now that she knows what not to do to keep from getting tripped up. Your pop? On the verge of bankruptcy. Dell feels guilty as all hell when he’s banging his own wife, ‘cause he has to think about her sister when he’s doing it.”

My mind was swimming now, all that late night shouting behind my parents’ closed bedroom door coming into focus.

“We live in a world of lies, kid. Lies are comforting. They make us feel safe, make us think everything is all right. Lies make us feel loved.” Harvey pulled the bottle up to his lips for another drink, momentarily forgetting that it was empty. He shook his head angrily, then tossed it into the yard where it came to rest among a dozen others.

“You’d think it was a good thing to always know the instant you meet someone what they’re thinking about, what they’re thinking about you. To always know the truth behind their words. But you’d be wrong. There’s no comfort in that.”

A heavy wave of despair washed over my body. I felt such pity for Harvey – for what he had been through, his loss of faith. I wanted to say something comforting, something in the way that my mother had of always finding a way to lift someone’s spirits when they were down. But I didn’t have the words.

“Of course you don’t,” Harvey said. “How could you?”

“I – I’m sorry, Harvey.”

“That’s why I moved way out here,” he said, ignoring my feeble attempt at comfort. “Far, far from the madding crowds of the city. I thought that less people would mean less noise. But the circles just keep growing. I can still hear the city – just like they were in that piece of shit trailer next door.”

Harvey sat down in the open doorway of the trailer, tracing the stubble on his chin with a finger. “You wanted a story, kid?”

I shook my head quickly. “No, that’s – “

“Back in the city, they ran some tests on me, when I started losing control of this whole thing.

Turns out that I was using more and more of my brain each day, a larger percentage. You know how they tell you in school that you use less than five percent of your brain’s capacity? I was up to twenty. Then twenty-two. Then twenty-five.” He stopped, then tilted his head at me. “You don’t believe me.”

“I – I didn’t say that – “

“You didn’t have to.” Harvey tapped his right finger against his temple. You didn’t have to.

I looked down at the ground, disappointed with myself.

“You know what else they tell you in school? That alcohol kills brain cells?” He paused again, waiting for my full attention. Look at me.

I looked up.

“I’m at war with my own brain, kid. It’s me against the dendrites.” He shrugged. “And I’m losing.”

Harvey pointed at me then, speaking in as somber a tone as I had ever heard. “You’ll be careful it doesn’t happen to you.”

* * *

TO BE CONCLUDED ON FRIDAY. . . .

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