Where to begin?
Firstly, apologies for not doing a blog post for so many months. I've had a real time at work recently and, unfortunately, I had to put all of my author bits on hold for a while. The company I was working for was making me work fifty hours every week, sometimes more (ah, Zero Hour Contracts, where would we be without you?), which didn't leave me a huge amount of time for writing. I brought this up with them and they made no effort to help me, so I told them to shove their job. I'm now working in a lovely cafe for twenty four hours a week and I get paid more per hour. This is perfect; I've already gotten so much writing done, it's unbelievable.
So, what am I working on? Well, I'm still writing my third fantasy novel 'Lay Me Restless'. It's set in the same nameless world as 'Endless Tides' and 'In the Footsteps of the Behemoth'. It's going really well. I'm really happy with the story and characters so far and I feel like my prose has improved too. It's a really exciting time for me. I've also resolved to write a short story every week too! This could be interesting, I haven't done many before, but it's something I definitely want to get in to more solidly.
I'm also editing a musical for a friend of mine. I'm not really sure how to attack it just yet as it's so different from what I usually do, but we'll see what I manage to come up with.
At the moment I'm reading 'Fury of the Sword' the third book in the 'Chronicles of Arkadia' series by the brilliant Jeff Jones. I highly recommend this entire series of books. The scale of them is breath-taking. 'Epic' Fantasy doesn't begin to describe them. I'm particularly impressed by how well Jones manages to infuse really personal human stories into his books too. It's not all the numbers of war, these are genuinely well-drawn characters and easy to get invested in. I'm really looking forward to finishing it. I wouldn't put it down if I didn't have my own writing to do!
So that's about it really. I'm going to try and start doing a blog once a week, if I can, so keep your eyes peeled.
Sam
One author's quest to have his ship pushed in the right direction.
Tuesday 3 December 2013
Saturday 17 August 2013
Update
So, I've been super busy which is why I haven't been able to do a blog post for a while. But what have I been busy with? Well, for starters, let's just say don't get a job in catering. Other than that, I've been promoting 'In the Footsteps of the Behemoth' and it's selling pretty well, too! I've received some really good feedback about it and people have gone from that back to 'Endless Tides'. Readers really seem to like my descriptions, which is very promising.
On the line of promoting, I was in the local paper this week. A very talented young journalist by the name of Jonny Hart wrote the article. Definitely one of the easiest interviews I've had. You can read the article here, if you're interested; http://www.wscountytimes.co.uk/news/local/author-s-new-book-is-out-of-this-world-1-5363606
I've reached page 100 of 'Lay Me Restless' so it;s progressing. It's progressing slowly, but it's progressing. I think my prose has really improved and this should be my best work when it's done.
In other news, I met another author who lives in the same town as me. She's called Vivian Hartley and she's lovely. She write's paranormal romance, which I wouldn't normally read, but it's a well crafted story, with some great dialogue and quirk. Vivian understands plot and she writes interesting characters. Her first book's called Teale Moon and if you're looking for something a little different, you might want to give it a go.
So, that's it for now. Hopefully, my next post will be little sooner than this one was.
Sam
On the line of promoting, I was in the local paper this week. A very talented young journalist by the name of Jonny Hart wrote the article. Definitely one of the easiest interviews I've had. You can read the article here, if you're interested; http://www.wscountytimes.co.uk/news/local/author-s-new-book-is-out-of-this-world-1-5363606
I've reached page 100 of 'Lay Me Restless' so it;s progressing. It's progressing slowly, but it's progressing. I think my prose has really improved and this should be my best work when it's done.
In other news, I met another author who lives in the same town as me. She's called Vivian Hartley and she's lovely. She write's paranormal romance, which I wouldn't normally read, but it's a well crafted story, with some great dialogue and quirk. Vivian understands plot and she writes interesting characters. Her first book's called Teale Moon and if you're looking for something a little different, you might want to give it a go.
So, that's it for now. Hopefully, my next post will be little sooner than this one was.
Sam
Friday 26 July 2013
In the Footsteps of the Behemoth
'In the Footsteps of the Behemoth' has been released! It's not really a sequel to 'Endless Tides' but it is set in the same world, one thousand years later. Here's the blurb:
'In a world blighted by feuding clans and constant conflict, there is a name spoken in even further hushed tones than the most fearsome of warlords; the Behemoth. A creature that towers above all in sight, with matted fur covering its rocky form. It has waged war with mankind for a millennium and stunted the progression of the species, leading to one question - why? One night, whilst on his way to a mysterious rendezvous, a shadus named Lament Strife is ambushed by famed warrior Vaiske Parlet who appears to suffer a mortal wound mere seconds before Lament passes out. When Lament awakes, Vaiske is nowhere to be found and the shadus is left with a peculiar illness afflicting him. In the days that follow, he resolves to find Vaiske Parlet and discover the reason for this strangest of occurrences. Meanwhile, Arvan Deit, a boy on the verge of manhood, sets out on his first adventure - to find his missing teacher, Master Lawliet Snow. Bored of his uneventful life as an orphan in a small town, Arvan vows to embark on a great quest and make his master proud. These characters are forced together by necessity but torn apart from one another by differing, and often conflicting, interests. Only one thing is certain; their journey leads in one direction - in the footsteps of the Behemoth.'
You can find it on Paperback here: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Footsteps-Behemoth-Sam-Leeves/dp/1909224405/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1374862359&sr=1-2
Enjoy!
Wednesday 17 July 2013
A Quick Update
So, I haven't been blogging much recently because I've been doing proper writing (sound the horns, Jameson! I want the mountains to know!), however I have, just for a moment, misplaced my quill (Jameson! Tell the search party to keep looking!) so I'll give you a quick update.
The first copies of 'In the Footsteps of the Behemoth' have been printed, I found out today, and I should have my copies in the next few weeks! The cover, by the amazingly talented Diego Gonzalez, is fantastic and I couldn't be happier with it. I don't have a release date yet, but soon, hopefully.
I'm making steady progress with 'Lay Me Restless'. It's just a matter of finding time to write it at the moment; between having a full time job and making sure Jameson is doing his (no, Jameson, serve from the left you oaf!) I don't have as much writing time as I would like. But progress is progress and it's being made.
I'm reading the first part of Dead Stars by the wonderful Ben Galley at the moment. I was lucky enough to be a beta reader but have held off on doing a review until I read the definitive version because you can't get all the magic with a PDF file that you do with a physical book.
Anyway, Jameson has found my quill (finally) unfortunately he's lost my ink pot now (DAMMIT, JAMESON!) and books don't write themselves, so I must away.
See you on the other side,
Sam
The first copies of 'In the Footsteps of the Behemoth' have been printed, I found out today, and I should have my copies in the next few weeks! The cover, by the amazingly talented Diego Gonzalez, is fantastic and I couldn't be happier with it. I don't have a release date yet, but soon, hopefully.
I'm making steady progress with 'Lay Me Restless'. It's just a matter of finding time to write it at the moment; between having a full time job and making sure Jameson is doing his (no, Jameson, serve from the left you oaf!) I don't have as much writing time as I would like. But progress is progress and it's being made.
I'm reading the first part of Dead Stars by the wonderful Ben Galley at the moment. I was lucky enough to be a beta reader but have held off on doing a review until I read the definitive version because you can't get all the magic with a PDF file that you do with a physical book.
Anyway, Jameson has found my quill (finally) unfortunately he's lost my ink pot now (DAMMIT, JAMESON!) and books don't write themselves, so I must away.
See you on the other side,
Sam
Sunday 16 June 2013
Once More Into the Breach!
I'm writing again! Time to get on with it, I decided. 'Lay Me Restless' is progressing and 'In the Footsteps of the Behemoth' should be published in the next couple of months. It's an exciting time.
That's it for now. Expect a possible short story in the next few days.
That's it for now. Expect a possible short story in the next few days.
Sunday 9 June 2013
Writer's Block
So, anyone who follows me on Twitter (the unlucky few, as I refer to them) might have noticed that I have writer's block. Not that I've mentioned it. Have definitely not brought it up... at every available opportunity... repeatedly. Okay, so maybe I've gone on about it a bit, but just a bit. Or a lot. But, and this is important so I hope you've managed to read this far, in my defence, it is very annoying.
See, I'm a writer. I write; it's who I am, it's ingrained into me. I'm also a musician. I musish (the actual verb for making music, who knew?); it's who I am. Again, it's ingrained into me. So, when I can't do one of these things, it's frustrating, because I'm not being me. Don't misunderstand, that's not all I am. I'm also sometime barista, sarcastic bastard, drunk and, on alternate Saturdays, Samantha, the stillettoed cocktail bar singer who turns men into quivering balls of sexual desire. But I try to play that stuff down.
What writer's block leads to, for me, is the search for inspiration. Trawling through my favourite albums, reading my favourite books, having intelligent (read: pretentious) conversations about symbolism in this label of wine versus this one (wait, this is a great label, but we can get two bottles of that one for the price of one of these. Great, let's get four). So, as you can see, my time is pretty much filled up with artistic stuff. This is great, there's just one problem; it's not leading anywhere. At the moment I can't even look a book. I'm reading Proust. If you want to read Proust it really helps if you look at the book. Dan Brown you can read without looking at the book. Needless to say, I'm not a huge Dan Brown fan.
So, the search for inspiration continues. Excuse me while I dive into Pearl Jam and Placebo again. What's that Proust? Not now. Soon, I promise you. Just not now.
See, I'm a writer. I write; it's who I am, it's ingrained into me. I'm also a musician. I musish (the actual verb for making music, who knew?); it's who I am. Again, it's ingrained into me. So, when I can't do one of these things, it's frustrating, because I'm not being me. Don't misunderstand, that's not all I am. I'm also sometime barista, sarcastic bastard, drunk and, on alternate Saturdays, Samantha, the stillettoed cocktail bar singer who turns men into quivering balls of sexual desire. But I try to play that stuff down.
What writer's block leads to, for me, is the search for inspiration. Trawling through my favourite albums, reading my favourite books, having intelligent (read: pretentious) conversations about symbolism in this label of wine versus this one (wait, this is a great label, but we can get two bottles of that one for the price of one of these. Great, let's get four). So, as you can see, my time is pretty much filled up with artistic stuff. This is great, there's just one problem; it's not leading anywhere. At the moment I can't even look a book. I'm reading Proust. If you want to read Proust it really helps if you look at the book. Dan Brown you can read without looking at the book. Needless to say, I'm not a huge Dan Brown fan.
So, the search for inspiration continues. Excuse me while I dive into Pearl Jam and Placebo again. What's that Proust? Not now. Soon, I promise you. Just not now.
Friday 31 May 2013
Misadventure of the Barista
I don't know why they sent me. Send someone who cares. Send someone who's indifferent. Hell, send someone who just plain doesn't care. But they didn't do any of that; they sent me. Not just someone who didn't care, someone who found the very idea of going abhorrent. In fact, not just the idea of going, the abstract concept of there being such a thing to go to.
Maybe I should go back a bit...
It all started a couple of weeks beforehand. I wandered into work and Max gave me a look that I would like to describe as "lugubrious", however that's mainly because I like the sound of the word, not because the look was anything close to being it. In fact, it was more disapproving than anything, bordering on envious. I ignored it (mainly because I couldn't use words like 'lugubrious' to describe it) and put my stuff in the secret closet (turning off to Max's poor joke that I was constantly in the secret closet...) then I stepped into the kitchen. "Kitchen" was perhaps too strong of a word for what I stepped into. It was, in reality, a part of the cafe behind a counter with a differently coloured floor. The cafe was empty, as usual, so whether or not a division was needed was yet to be seen.
"I see you've managed to get out of working Friday," Max seethed.
I gave him a curious look which I assumed he didn't want (or at least unwrapped) because he looked away pretty quickly.
"I'm sorry?" I said.
Max looked back at me. "Maddy's given you Friday off."
I frowned, more out of confusion than frustration. Any day off is a blessing. Any day off that I don't have to go to the dullest place in the world for 10 hours is a blessing in much the same way that any day where I have to go to work is a curse beyond compare.
"It's the first I've heard about it," I said, trying to hide my glee.
"Yeah, she's taken you off the rota and now I have to work."
I could see Max getting typically tense and decided not to antagonise the situation.
I shrugged. "More money, at least."
He scowled at me.
"Another perk of being Ellen's favourite," he muttered.
"I'm sorry?"
His eyes sharpened further. "Ellen's requested your company at some Coffee Festival..."
Now, I love coffee as much as anyone, more than most people in fact, but I never considered putting the words "Coffee" and "Festival" together. I like toast, but I'm not going to throw a parade for it.
"What, in all that Odin holds dear, is a Coffee Festival?" I asked in a tone that I thought was incredulous, but having never looked "incredulous" up in the dictionary I wouldn't know whether or not it really was.
Max leaned against the counter, enjoying my angst. "Your reason for being in Ellen's company for an entire day."
"Am I getting paid?"
Max shook his head. "She said she'd pay your train fair."
I sighed. "Motherfucker..."
Later that day, driven to near-insanity by Max's habitual moaning and the lack of even one customer, I decided to do the banking and take a walk to the other cafe, run by the same company, in our town. By virtue of there actually being customers at the other cafe the company decided to post our manager, Maddy, there.
"Hey, Sam!" she sang as I entered.
"Hello, Maddy."
"You hear about the Coffee Festival?" she asked, gleefully pouring milk on top of espresso.
"Yeah," I sighed, ignoring the annoyed glance of a customer waiting at the till. "I hear Ellen chose me especially."
Maddy said nothing.
"Maddy?"
"Kiiiind of," she sang.
"Kind of?"
"Well..." she paused, then caught my look. "Well, Ellen actually asked me, but I can't go because that's the start of my annual leave. So I suggested you. So, you were hand-picked by the person who was hand-picked by Ellen."
She looked away, then she looked back.
"So this is the kind of thing we pass around until we find someone who can't pass it on to anyone else?" I asked.
Maddy didn't say anything for a few seconds. Then she sighed, "Yes."
"So I could pass it onto..."
"Nobody," she replied. "I'm the manager, my word's final. Besides, good luck finding anyone stupid enough to falling for an entire day with Ellen."
I tried to ignore the fact that I'd been stupid enough to fall for an entire day with Ellen, even if it was only due to my superior forcing it upon me. I was about to retort when I was interrupted by the customer at the till.
"Can I get some service please?!?"
I gave him a hard look that I don't usually employ, but, seeing its effect on the man (silencing him and turning him into a cowering ball of humanoid flesh) I decided to use it more.
Eventually, Friday came. Ellen sent me an email the day before telling me to be in London (she was actually that vague, "London"; like it's about 5m square) at 10:30am. I had to catch the 8:50 train. I was about to leave for it when I got a text from Max.
Fire at 3 bridges. Runnin l8. Can u open 4 me plz.
I tried not to let the text speech and blatant disregard for anything resembling correct grammar bother me, but, after just finishing my proof-reading of 'In the Footsteps of the Behemoth', I couldn't resist responding with the edited version of what he sent me along with explaining, in no uncertain terms, that I actually had somewhere to be and, more to the point, that it wasn't my problem that there was a fire on the trains.
As I left the house, Max replied explaining that the affected station was actually on my route so it did, indeed, affect me greatly after all.
I changed my direction and ended up at work, just in time to open. In no mood to do anything resembling work, I made myself a coffee and sat at one of the tables leisurely scrolling through the past few hours of Twitter and wondering why I ever signed up for it. Decidedly not in uniform, I was ignored as a customer walked over to the counter and waited to be served. I smiled.
He was stood there a few minutes before he turned to me and said, "Do you know where the staff have gone?"
I shrugged.
The man grunted, "People don't do their jobs properly these days. If I did my job like this I'd be fired."
"Really?" I asked. "And what line of work are you in?"
"Banking."
I was about to make a comment about how it must have been difficult to enter into a job which has 'counting' as it's primary skill (especially considering that the man didn't have enough wit for me to imagine him finishing Primary School). Unfortunately, he turned my original question back at me.
I was going to say 'writing' but having been sent the 'Endless Tides' sales figures the day before by my publisher, I thought this was too much of a lie. "Catering."
He raised a curious eyebrow but, luckily, I was saved by any further interrogation by Max wandering in. He scowled at me when he saw the game I'd been playing with the customer. I just got up and left.
I arrived at the train station a few minutes later. It was raining and I was soaked. Still, I bought my ticket from a surly attendant (you know, the kind that makes you think euthanasia should be legal just so we can put moody bastards like that out of their misery) and boarded the train. I was going to read (I can't remember what book I was reading back then) but I was annoyed from the morning's trials and knew that more were surely to come so I decided just to prepare myself for them. Or, at least, that was my first instinct. Ignoring my usually sound common sense I decided to take this time to text my good friend Lily.
Now, around this time, and to this day I have no idea why, Lily wasn't in the best of moods with me. Whether or not I'd done something or whether Lily was just having one of her sporadic I-Need-To-Be-Annoyed-With-Someone-And-You're-The-Closest-Person-To-Me-At-This-Current-Time phases and simply picked me as her folly, I'm not sure. However, whether or not her scorn was deserved or merely one of her whims, I decided to try and stop the bridge from burning completely.
Lilly, how are you brother? You haven't worked yourself to death have you? I'm already having a hilariously shit day! Books are going okay, started the third one now and the second should be published soon. On my way to London for a Coffee Festival (who knew?).
I waited, noting the middle-aged man who had yet to take his eyes off of me since I boarded. This happens to me quite regularly and I'm still unsure if these are disapproving looks at the length of my hair and general disheveled appearance or if I'm actually quite attractive and people are lusting after me. Personally, I think it's the second of these, but it wouldn't be the first time I'd been wrong.
My phone beeped.
I am still alive, still beautiful. Good luck with books. Enjoy London.
Now, Lily and I have a strange kind of friendship. We have a habit of living in each other's pockets and not minding, talking near endlessly without it being annoying and laughing until we can hardly breath. Needless to say, simple sentences don't tend to play a huge part in our conversations.
I decided to reply.
Beautiful, eh? I haven't seen you in so long I'm sure I couldn't comment! I'm sure London will enjoy me more than I'll enjoy it. Are you working today?
The man was still looking at me. For a while I felt flattered, but now I was starting to feel slightly violated. I nestled into the wool of my aviator jacket in some hope to find comfort, but none came. The man groped his own thigh.
My phone beeped.
12-6
I sighed, trying to work out what had happened between my best friend and I.
Shall we go for a drink when I get back?
"Say 'no' or I'll die of shock," I muttered to myself.
Let's just say I'm still alive.
For some reason (trains aren't my specialty. I once went to Heathrow Airport, to meet Lily nonetheless, and on the Underground I failed to understand why none of the trains said Green Park on them. After half an hour of no trains going to where I needed to get to, I eventually asked the conductor when the next train to Green Park would arrive. He turned to me, mocking smile intact, and said "All of these trains are going to Green Park." Still, I'm getting sidetracked by other misadventures, of which there are many.) I had to change at East Croydon. I stepped off of the train and onto the platform. Just as my original train was departing a voice came over the speaker system.
We regret to inform all passengers that all trains to London have been suspended due a fatality on the line.
"Please say it was me," I moaned. Unfortunately, looking around (in fact by virtue of being able to look around), I deducted that only my will to live had died on the line and the rest of me had gotten away relatively unscathed.
I sat on one of the benches ignoring the pregnant woman who'd been racing me towards it. The smell of coffee drifted over to me and I started to salivate slightly. That's what I needed; caffeine, drug of the Gods. I opened my wallet. I'm sure you've all seen it in cartoons when a character opens their wallet and a moth flies out? Well, and this is no exaggeration, I'm sure that a ghost drifted out, the spine of the wallet creaked in agony, there were cobwebs where there should have been money and my debit card croaked "Kill me." It was then I remembered that I had a grand total of £8.76 in my bank account and I had yet to pay my rent. Still, this didn't change the fact that I needed coffee and the Coffee Festival was still ten miles away.
I sauntered, as I so often do when I realise I'm going to need to be charming, over to the coffee stall and leaned on the bar.
"Whatcha wan'?" The rather attractive woman running the stall asked. I'm not fluent in the language of London and it's many boroughs, but I think what she said roughly translates as "Hello, dear sir. Have you come to purchase a coffee? As you can see by the board behind me we have many different varieties. Cappuccino, Latte, Mocha. They come in sizes large and small at a reasonable price. If coffee isn't the beverage you seek, might I interest you in a Hot Chocolate? Perhaps even tea? You seem a sophisticated gent, I have a selection of fruit and herbal teas or mayhap you would prefer chai? So, what can I interest you with?"
I smiled.
"I have a slight problem," I said. "I'm desperately tired and I need caffeine to fuel me on what has turned out to be a never-ending trip. Now, I hope you won't think me parsimonious, however I have a slight currency issue (that being I have no money to speak of or even to be in silence of) and I was wondering if perhaps I could offer you something else in return for a cappuccino?"
She frowned. "So you ain' gonna pay?" (For those of you who have misplaced your London-English Dictionary, I believe this translates as, "Dear sir, you mean to tell me that you have not the funds to purchase one of my fine coffees using the traditional method?")
"I can pay," I said. "Just not with money."
Her frown intensified. "You ain' sayin' you wan' me to 'ave sex wiff ya so you don' 'aff ta pay, is ya?" (Dear sir, are you proposing that we frolic betwixt the sheets in some passionate lust in return for a hot caffeinated beverage, as opposed to you passing over some pounds and pence?"
"Not at all!" I said. "I merely wished to suggest that perhaps I could mop? If you're bored and there is no mopping to do, maybe I could serenade you? I have a copy of my first Fantasy novel, Endless Tides on me. Maybe that would be sufficient payment?"
She gave me a hard look. "I wouldn' wipe me arse on ya book. Na, fuck off!"
I fear, apart from a few missing consonants and the wrong vowel in certain places, that this last utterance is the same in all areas of England.
In the interest of making sure that this already long story doesn't get a ridiculous amount longer, I'll just say this. Eventually my train arrived, I got on, I met a variety of strange people who I was sarcastic to without them realising, my train arrived at my station, I got off the train and found the Coffee Festival, with the help of a Scottish man (who was nothing like the way media portrays them).
By this time, I was already three hours late for the Coffee Festival and I couldn't imagine Ellen being particularly pleased about it. Then again, I caught my reflection in one of the windows and realised I looked like a particularly annoyed Jim Morrison who'd just got out of bed and that I didn't particularly give two shits whether or not Ellen was happy or not. I phoned her from outside.
"Hello?" she answered.
"Ellen, it's Sam."
"Sam! How are you? How's the Coffee Festival? Isn't it magical?"
It was only now that I realised that Ellen wasn't actually at the Coffee Festival.
"Oh, magical doesn't describe it, Ellen. It's as if God planted a coffee bean and watched it grow into a blossoming Flat White. One thing though, I've had a bit of trouble finding everyone else?"
"Oh, did Maddy not tell you? You're the representative of the whole company! Anyway, you have fun and have the report on my desk by the Monday, okay?"
She hung up.
I sighed and headed back to the train station.
I'd tell you what I said in my report, but I don't even think the internet would let me print it.
Maybe I should go back a bit...
It all started a couple of weeks beforehand. I wandered into work and Max gave me a look that I would like to describe as "lugubrious", however that's mainly because I like the sound of the word, not because the look was anything close to being it. In fact, it was more disapproving than anything, bordering on envious. I ignored it (mainly because I couldn't use words like 'lugubrious' to describe it) and put my stuff in the secret closet (turning off to Max's poor joke that I was constantly in the secret closet...) then I stepped into the kitchen. "Kitchen" was perhaps too strong of a word for what I stepped into. It was, in reality, a part of the cafe behind a counter with a differently coloured floor. The cafe was empty, as usual, so whether or not a division was needed was yet to be seen.
"I see you've managed to get out of working Friday," Max seethed.
I gave him a curious look which I assumed he didn't want (or at least unwrapped) because he looked away pretty quickly.
"I'm sorry?" I said.
Max looked back at me. "Maddy's given you Friday off."
I frowned, more out of confusion than frustration. Any day off is a blessing. Any day off that I don't have to go to the dullest place in the world for 10 hours is a blessing in much the same way that any day where I have to go to work is a curse beyond compare.
"It's the first I've heard about it," I said, trying to hide my glee.
"Yeah, she's taken you off the rota and now I have to work."
I could see Max getting typically tense and decided not to antagonise the situation.
I shrugged. "More money, at least."
He scowled at me.
"Another perk of being Ellen's favourite," he muttered.
"I'm sorry?"
His eyes sharpened further. "Ellen's requested your company at some Coffee Festival..."
Now, I love coffee as much as anyone, more than most people in fact, but I never considered putting the words "Coffee" and "Festival" together. I like toast, but I'm not going to throw a parade for it.
"What, in all that Odin holds dear, is a Coffee Festival?" I asked in a tone that I thought was incredulous, but having never looked "incredulous" up in the dictionary I wouldn't know whether or not it really was.
Max leaned against the counter, enjoying my angst. "Your reason for being in Ellen's company for an entire day."
"Am I getting paid?"
Max shook his head. "She said she'd pay your train fair."
I sighed. "Motherfucker..."
Later that day, driven to near-insanity by Max's habitual moaning and the lack of even one customer, I decided to do the banking and take a walk to the other cafe, run by the same company, in our town. By virtue of there actually being customers at the other cafe the company decided to post our manager, Maddy, there.
"Hey, Sam!" she sang as I entered.
"Hello, Maddy."
"You hear about the Coffee Festival?" she asked, gleefully pouring milk on top of espresso.
"Yeah," I sighed, ignoring the annoyed glance of a customer waiting at the till. "I hear Ellen chose me especially."
Maddy said nothing.
"Maddy?"
"Kiiiind of," she sang.
"Kind of?"
"Well..." she paused, then caught my look. "Well, Ellen actually asked me, but I can't go because that's the start of my annual leave. So I suggested you. So, you were hand-picked by the person who was hand-picked by Ellen."
She looked away, then she looked back.
"So this is the kind of thing we pass around until we find someone who can't pass it on to anyone else?" I asked.
Maddy didn't say anything for a few seconds. Then she sighed, "Yes."
"So I could pass it onto..."
"Nobody," she replied. "I'm the manager, my word's final. Besides, good luck finding anyone stupid enough to falling for an entire day with Ellen."
I tried to ignore the fact that I'd been stupid enough to fall for an entire day with Ellen, even if it was only due to my superior forcing it upon me. I was about to retort when I was interrupted by the customer at the till.
"Can I get some service please?!?"
I gave him a hard look that I don't usually employ, but, seeing its effect on the man (silencing him and turning him into a cowering ball of humanoid flesh) I decided to use it more.
Eventually, Friday came. Ellen sent me an email the day before telling me to be in London (she was actually that vague, "London"; like it's about 5m square) at 10:30am. I had to catch the 8:50 train. I was about to leave for it when I got a text from Max.
Fire at 3 bridges. Runnin l8. Can u open 4 me plz.
I tried not to let the text speech and blatant disregard for anything resembling correct grammar bother me, but, after just finishing my proof-reading of 'In the Footsteps of the Behemoth', I couldn't resist responding with the edited version of what he sent me along with explaining, in no uncertain terms, that I actually had somewhere to be and, more to the point, that it wasn't my problem that there was a fire on the trains.
As I left the house, Max replied explaining that the affected station was actually on my route so it did, indeed, affect me greatly after all.
I changed my direction and ended up at work, just in time to open. In no mood to do anything resembling work, I made myself a coffee and sat at one of the tables leisurely scrolling through the past few hours of Twitter and wondering why I ever signed up for it. Decidedly not in uniform, I was ignored as a customer walked over to the counter and waited to be served. I smiled.
He was stood there a few minutes before he turned to me and said, "Do you know where the staff have gone?"
I shrugged.
The man grunted, "People don't do their jobs properly these days. If I did my job like this I'd be fired."
"Really?" I asked. "And what line of work are you in?"
"Banking."
I was about to make a comment about how it must have been difficult to enter into a job which has 'counting' as it's primary skill (especially considering that the man didn't have enough wit for me to imagine him finishing Primary School). Unfortunately, he turned my original question back at me.
I was going to say 'writing' but having been sent the 'Endless Tides' sales figures the day before by my publisher, I thought this was too much of a lie. "Catering."
He raised a curious eyebrow but, luckily, I was saved by any further interrogation by Max wandering in. He scowled at me when he saw the game I'd been playing with the customer. I just got up and left.
I arrived at the train station a few minutes later. It was raining and I was soaked. Still, I bought my ticket from a surly attendant (you know, the kind that makes you think euthanasia should be legal just so we can put moody bastards like that out of their misery) and boarded the train. I was going to read (I can't remember what book I was reading back then) but I was annoyed from the morning's trials and knew that more were surely to come so I decided just to prepare myself for them. Or, at least, that was my first instinct. Ignoring my usually sound common sense I decided to take this time to text my good friend Lily.
Now, around this time, and to this day I have no idea why, Lily wasn't in the best of moods with me. Whether or not I'd done something or whether Lily was just having one of her sporadic I-Need-To-Be-Annoyed-With-Someone-And-You're-The-Closest-Person-To-Me-At-This-Current-Time phases and simply picked me as her folly, I'm not sure. However, whether or not her scorn was deserved or merely one of her whims, I decided to try and stop the bridge from burning completely.
Lilly, how are you brother? You haven't worked yourself to death have you? I'm already having a hilariously shit day! Books are going okay, started the third one now and the second should be published soon. On my way to London for a Coffee Festival (who knew?).
I waited, noting the middle-aged man who had yet to take his eyes off of me since I boarded. This happens to me quite regularly and I'm still unsure if these are disapproving looks at the length of my hair and general disheveled appearance or if I'm actually quite attractive and people are lusting after me. Personally, I think it's the second of these, but it wouldn't be the first time I'd been wrong.
My phone beeped.
I am still alive, still beautiful. Good luck with books. Enjoy London.
Now, Lily and I have a strange kind of friendship. We have a habit of living in each other's pockets and not minding, talking near endlessly without it being annoying and laughing until we can hardly breath. Needless to say, simple sentences don't tend to play a huge part in our conversations.
I decided to reply.
Beautiful, eh? I haven't seen you in so long I'm sure I couldn't comment! I'm sure London will enjoy me more than I'll enjoy it. Are you working today?
The man was still looking at me. For a while I felt flattered, but now I was starting to feel slightly violated. I nestled into the wool of my aviator jacket in some hope to find comfort, but none came. The man groped his own thigh.
My phone beeped.
12-6
I sighed, trying to work out what had happened between my best friend and I.
Shall we go for a drink when I get back?
"Say 'no' or I'll die of shock," I muttered to myself.
Let's just say I'm still alive.
For some reason (trains aren't my specialty. I once went to Heathrow Airport, to meet Lily nonetheless, and on the Underground I failed to understand why none of the trains said Green Park on them. After half an hour of no trains going to where I needed to get to, I eventually asked the conductor when the next train to Green Park would arrive. He turned to me, mocking smile intact, and said "All of these trains are going to Green Park." Still, I'm getting sidetracked by other misadventures, of which there are many.) I had to change at East Croydon. I stepped off of the train and onto the platform. Just as my original train was departing a voice came over the speaker system.
We regret to inform all passengers that all trains to London have been suspended due a fatality on the line.
"Please say it was me," I moaned. Unfortunately, looking around (in fact by virtue of being able to look around), I deducted that only my will to live had died on the line and the rest of me had gotten away relatively unscathed.
I sat on one of the benches ignoring the pregnant woman who'd been racing me towards it. The smell of coffee drifted over to me and I started to salivate slightly. That's what I needed; caffeine, drug of the Gods. I opened my wallet. I'm sure you've all seen it in cartoons when a character opens their wallet and a moth flies out? Well, and this is no exaggeration, I'm sure that a ghost drifted out, the spine of the wallet creaked in agony, there were cobwebs where there should have been money and my debit card croaked "Kill me." It was then I remembered that I had a grand total of £8.76 in my bank account and I had yet to pay my rent. Still, this didn't change the fact that I needed coffee and the Coffee Festival was still ten miles away.
I sauntered, as I so often do when I realise I'm going to need to be charming, over to the coffee stall and leaned on the bar.
"Whatcha wan'?" The rather attractive woman running the stall asked. I'm not fluent in the language of London and it's many boroughs, but I think what she said roughly translates as "Hello, dear sir. Have you come to purchase a coffee? As you can see by the board behind me we have many different varieties. Cappuccino, Latte, Mocha. They come in sizes large and small at a reasonable price. If coffee isn't the beverage you seek, might I interest you in a Hot Chocolate? Perhaps even tea? You seem a sophisticated gent, I have a selection of fruit and herbal teas or mayhap you would prefer chai? So, what can I interest you with?"
I smiled.
"I have a slight problem," I said. "I'm desperately tired and I need caffeine to fuel me on what has turned out to be a never-ending trip. Now, I hope you won't think me parsimonious, however I have a slight currency issue (that being I have no money to speak of or even to be in silence of) and I was wondering if perhaps I could offer you something else in return for a cappuccino?"
She frowned. "So you ain' gonna pay?" (For those of you who have misplaced your London-English Dictionary, I believe this translates as, "Dear sir, you mean to tell me that you have not the funds to purchase one of my fine coffees using the traditional method?")
"I can pay," I said. "Just not with money."
Her frown intensified. "You ain' sayin' you wan' me to 'ave sex wiff ya so you don' 'aff ta pay, is ya?" (Dear sir, are you proposing that we frolic betwixt the sheets in some passionate lust in return for a hot caffeinated beverage, as opposed to you passing over some pounds and pence?"
"Not at all!" I said. "I merely wished to suggest that perhaps I could mop? If you're bored and there is no mopping to do, maybe I could serenade you? I have a copy of my first Fantasy novel, Endless Tides on me. Maybe that would be sufficient payment?"
She gave me a hard look. "I wouldn' wipe me arse on ya book. Na, fuck off!"
I fear, apart from a few missing consonants and the wrong vowel in certain places, that this last utterance is the same in all areas of England.
In the interest of making sure that this already long story doesn't get a ridiculous amount longer, I'll just say this. Eventually my train arrived, I got on, I met a variety of strange people who I was sarcastic to without them realising, my train arrived at my station, I got off the train and found the Coffee Festival, with the help of a Scottish man (who was nothing like the way media portrays them).
By this time, I was already three hours late for the Coffee Festival and I couldn't imagine Ellen being particularly pleased about it. Then again, I caught my reflection in one of the windows and realised I looked like a particularly annoyed Jim Morrison who'd just got out of bed and that I didn't particularly give two shits whether or not Ellen was happy or not. I phoned her from outside.
"Hello?" she answered.
"Ellen, it's Sam."
"Sam! How are you? How's the Coffee Festival? Isn't it magical?"
It was only now that I realised that Ellen wasn't actually at the Coffee Festival.
"Oh, magical doesn't describe it, Ellen. It's as if God planted a coffee bean and watched it grow into a blossoming Flat White. One thing though, I've had a bit of trouble finding everyone else?"
"Oh, did Maddy not tell you? You're the representative of the whole company! Anyway, you have fun and have the report on my desk by the Monday, okay?"
She hung up.
I sighed and headed back to the train station.
I'd tell you what I said in my report, but I don't even think the internet would let me print it.
Sunday 26 May 2013
Inspiration
So May's been a little slow for writing. Between work and the fact that people seem to be intent on me having a social life (who knew they actually liked me?) it's been a little difficult to sit down and put pen to paper. Besides, there's a far more pressing matter that's getting in the way of my creativity; I just don't feel inspired.
It's difficult to say why I don't feel inspired, though I'm fairly sure that going to the most boring place on earth every day for 8-10 hours doesn't help. Then again, what do I know? Not a lot, if this blank page sitting before me is anything to go by.
See, I know what I want to write. I know what's going to happen. I know what the characters are thinking and how that affects their actions. I know what's going to happen 20 chapters on. I know what's going to happen three books on. I know what to write, I even have entire passages mapped out in my head. I just can't get it on the page. Well, that's not strictly true. I can get it on the page in about five minute spurts. The problem is, my soul wants to write, but my mind doesn't.
So I'm doing the usual things to inspire myself. Great books, great music, great films might have to go in for some video games soon. I went back and read 'Catcher in the Rye'. I've been listening to my favourite bands. I've been watching my favourite films. I've been listening to new music and watching new films. At the moment I'm reading 'Destiny of the Sword' by J. Jones. It's fantastic and it's actually helping. It's making me yearn for a full page again, which is half the battle.
Put the coffee on Jameson! The page is blank and I need fuel!
Monday 22 April 2013
A Typical Sunday
"Yeah, I'm not coming in today," the voice on the other end of the phone said with its usual aversion to pronouncing all of the audible letters in a word.
I frowned, not that it did much good. Max couldn't see it, being 30 miles away as he was.
"Why, exactly?" I seethed.
"Look at the budget," he urged.
Although supposedly good at my job (or good enough to be promoted to the lofty station of 'supervisor', at least...) there were more than a few things that I wasn't actually sure how to do. Checking the staff budget was one of them. I gave the till a contemptuous look and thought about making a conscious effort to actually work it out, but instead decided on keeping up with the pretense that had seen me that far already.
"Oh yeah," I said in my most convincing tone. "Isn't that something?"
"I know!" Max said worriedly. "Ellen would have our arses if it got much higher. It's best I don't come in."
I frowned again before remembering he couldn't see me. "You didn't think of bringing this up yesterday?"
There was a long pause. "Actually, it just came to me a few minutes ago."
"Surprising..." I muttered. Then louder. "You realise that means I have to work open - close, just like last Sunday, by the way, don't you?"
"Oh yeah," Max said. "I hadn't thought about that."
I growled, forgetting myself.
"Look," he said. "I can come in, but you need to let me know in the next five minutes otherwise I'm not going to be able to catch the train."
"Yes I want you to bloody come in!" I shouted. "You know I want you to come in! I'm suppose to finish at 2 and you want me to finish at 6. I do have a life outside of work, you know; hard as it may be to believe."
"You've got plans then?"
As far as I was concerned, I did have plans. Going home and nursing my hangover, to me, was a plan and a much better plan than staying at work and nursing my hangover.
"I had an afternoon off at the weekend (something of a rarity, in case you hadn't noticed); of course I had plans."
"Ah," Max said, knowingly. "Asprin and a nice warm blanket, before starting the cycle again tonight?"
I snorted, a little in anger and a little in amusement, but mainly because it seemed in keeping with my general demeanor.
"My reputation precedes me," I said. "Look, can't you just come in? I feel like crap."
"You've got a day off tomorrow," Max yawned.
"I do at the moment," I laughed. "You'll probably decide you're not going to come in and Maddy'll call me up and say I have to work."
"That won't happen!" Max said. "Look, I'm going to phone Maddy and let her know what's going on."
"What that you're coming in so I can leave at 2?"
"Very funny."
I sighed, trying to calm myself. Then the anger burst out of me again.
"You're a peach, Max," I said, enunciating almost every second syllable, like some over-trained actor. "A real peach. You know that? I hope you know that, buddy."
"Calm down," he said. "It's not so bad a job."
I didn't say anything.
The dialtone started.
I slammed the phone back into the cradle, imagining it was a particularly sensitive part of Max's body.
"Motherfucker," I muttered.
The cafe was typically empty. The wooden floor (which only I seemed too bothered about sweeping and mopping, Max opting to save such ceremonies for "special occasions"), was spotless, owing mainly to the fact that I closed the night before and I hadn't had a customer yet. The few tables were pristine, except for one that was at slightly less of a right-angle than I would have liked. I sighed and walked over, adjusting it accordingly before looking out of the window (which encompassed the entire northern wall) at the empty street. The sun hit the stone in a way I thought would have been quite artistic if I wasn't in a town I regarded (and still do) and the most mundane place on the planet.
I ambled over to the coffee machine and made myself a cappuccino which, after working in coffee shops for longer than I had ever intended, was second nature to me.
Put coffee in holder.
Lock holder in machine.
Put cup under holder.
Press the button.
Put milk in jug.
Put steamer arm in milk.
Turn lever.
Wait for milk to heat and thicken.
Turn lever the other way.
Pour milk into cup.
Repeat depending on the amount of orders you have.
I thought about all of the training the company had paid for me to have and how all that training had really encompassed was heating milk. My manager, Maddy, readily admitted that I didn't really need the training but "It wouldn't hurt". Annoyed at the condescending tone of the "expert" I lost my concentration and burned my forearm on the milk steamer. Maddy had been wrong. It did hurt.
The phone rang and I grabbed it.
"Hello, Maddy," I sighed.
"How did you know it was me?" she laughed.
"Well, it was either you or the president of Penguin Books phoning to tell me that they'd read 'Endless Tides' and wanted to publish my next book and give me a ridiculous sum of money for it, but, then I remembered that he was going to get back to me sometime next week. Thusly, by process of elimination (elimination, in your case, probably not being the worst thing in the world) I deducted that it was you."
There was a pause.
"I didn't get any of that," Maddy said in that voice that had an aversion to saying "T"s.
"Don't worry about it," I sighed at the thought of wasting quite a good rant. "How can I help?"
"You've spoken to Max?" she asked.
"I spoke," I said. "Judging by the outcome of the conversation he either wasn't listening or didn't hear. But I suppose we could be said to have spoken."
"Uh... okay. So you know he's not coming in?"
"I am all too aware."
"It's a good idea the two of you had," she said. "That's the sort of thinking Ellen likes to see."
"Indeed," I said in a voice that transformed the actual meaning of the word into 'Of course she does. Who wouldn't like me to work on my own so that they could line their own pockets with money that has been earned exclusively down to my hard work.'
"Well," Maddy said. "As long as you're okay with it."
I didn't say anything.
The dialtone started.
I slammed the phone back into the cradle imagining it was something that Maddy really cared about. You know, like a vase handed down her family through generations or one of her kids' faces.
"Motherfucker..." I muttered.
I'd been open almost an hour and I still hadn't had a customer. Now, I'm what has always been referred to as a 'hard worker' but it's pretty hard to live up to that when there's no work to be done. I'd already done the weekly cleaning (which in my case was more like the daily cleaning) and I'd just spent half an hour organising the CVs that people had handed in into alphabetical order, gender and age, photocopying each one so there three copies in order for me to see which order I liked the most.
"The next person who hands a CV in can have my job," I muttered, placing all three filing systems next to the till.
Although a hard worker, I always made it a point of honour never to take work too seriously, if only for the fact that I have better things to do with my time. As such, I like to keep my mobile phone on me just in case, and this is really a shot in the dark, someone vaguely interesting wants to get in touch with me. What can I say? I'm all about making the day go quicker.
It just so happened, at that moment, I got a phone call from someone I deemed (and, to this day, deem) one of the most interesting people on the planet.
"Hello, Lilly," I said with a smile.
"Hello, stranger," she said in that voice that was half-way between cutesey and sarcastic. "What are you up to?"
"I'm at work, or in Hell. It's hard to tell the difference. Which is the one with the red guy who carries the pitchfork?"
She laughed. "That would be Hell. I believe his name's Satan."
I smiled. "Satan? No, this guy's Stan. I think he has high blood pressure. As for the pitchfork, I can only assume he's one of my more rural customers."
She laughed again, then we shared a silence that only the best of friends can comfortably share.
"It's dead here," I eventually said. "Come for a coffee."
"I can't," she sighed. "I have work in half an hour."
"Better be quick then," I joked. "How is work?"
"Don't try and be funny with me, stranger," she growled, but I knew she wasn't angry at me. "You know perfectly well how work is."
"Do I now, brother?" I laughed, partly at the way she was trying to butt heads with me and partly at amount of inflections I'd put in the sentence.. 'Brother' was just one of the myriad in-jokes we had. "What's so bad about it over there?"
Judging by the strange noise she made I guess she was trying not to laugh.
"You know what's wrong with it," she said. "I hate it. I just hate it. Spending all my day waiting for customers to walk in. I hate it."
"Tell me what that's like," I laughed. "Sorry, Lilly, but I didn't quite catch the sentiment in that sentence. I get the feeling that you hate it, but you didn't say outright..."
"Do you have to antagonise every situation?"
I shrugged, before remembering she couldn't see me.
"How is Aunt Agonise, these days?" I asked in the accent I always imagined Holden Caulfield as speaking in.
She laughed, then she sighed. "I have to go."
"Okay," I said. "Chin up though, yeah?"
"Yeah," she said. "I'll see you next week."
I smiled. "That's what you said last week and the one before that, if my memory serves me correctly."
"I'm working all the time in a job I hate," she said. "It's not easy."
"You're not the only person who hates their job," I said suggestively.
"Really now, brother? Well, I mean it this week. I want to see you."
"We'll see," I said. "You'll feel differently when you actually see me, I'm sure."
"Oh, definitely," she laughed.
We said "bye" and we both hung up.
It's at this point that I'd like the reader to remember that I opened at 10am. It was now 13:30 and my first customer came in. They were the upper end middle-aged and the upper end of middle-class and the type of customer I tended to get in our 'artisan' coffee shop. He gave me a look I was used to (the kind of look that told me he didn't approve of the length of my hair...) and walked over to the till.
"I'll have a Flat White," he said.
Having been a barista for over a year by that point, it was my professional opinion (and still is, I hasten to add) that anyone who ordered a Flat White was, for the very act of ordering a Flat White, an arsehole. Add into the mix that he didn't even say 'hello', 'please' or, when I gave him his change, ' thank you' and you have something a little stronger than my usual disdain for the customers.
I made it for him and took it to his table. He didn't thank me for that either. When I got back to the coffee machine I muttered, under my breath, "Motherfucker..."
It was just about that time when my anger reached it's high point and I wrote this note for Max:
'Dear Max,
Thank you so much for deciding to let me work today, you absolutemotherfu shithead arsehole. It has been a real peach of a day. It's almost two o'clock and I've had one customer so, as you can imagine, it's been pretty exciting for me. It's a good thing I have a day off tomorrow otherwise I'd probably die from too much adrenaline.
I hope staying at home wasn't to straining!!!! You didn't pull a muscle putting your feet up on the sofa, did you? I hope not. Because you're going all of your leg muscles to run from me and the axe I'm going to be holding the very next time I see you.
Incidently, when are you moving back in with your parents? Soon isn't it? And why did you have to move back in? Was it because you couldn't pay the rent on your old place by any chance? Have you considered working more hours as opposed to less? For some reason, and I can't quite work it out, but when I work more hours my pay cheque is bigger. Now, I'm not saying that the two are related, but maybe you could try it one month and maybe we'll have more evidence? Just a thought.
I have to go now because somebody (read: me/myself/I) has to sweep and mop the floor which, despite it being part of your job, you seem incapable of doing.
Enjoy breathing while you still have a body to keep up the habit.
I frowned, not that it did much good. Max couldn't see it, being 30 miles away as he was.
"Why, exactly?" I seethed.
"Look at the budget," he urged.
Although supposedly good at my job (or good enough to be promoted to the lofty station of 'supervisor', at least...) there were more than a few things that I wasn't actually sure how to do. Checking the staff budget was one of them. I gave the till a contemptuous look and thought about making a conscious effort to actually work it out, but instead decided on keeping up with the pretense that had seen me that far already.
"Oh yeah," I said in my most convincing tone. "Isn't that something?"
"I know!" Max said worriedly. "Ellen would have our arses if it got much higher. It's best I don't come in."
I frowned again before remembering he couldn't see me. "You didn't think of bringing this up yesterday?"
There was a long pause. "Actually, it just came to me a few minutes ago."
"Surprising..." I muttered. Then louder. "You realise that means I have to work open - close, just like last Sunday, by the way, don't you?"
"Oh yeah," Max said. "I hadn't thought about that."
I growled, forgetting myself.
"Look," he said. "I can come in, but you need to let me know in the next five minutes otherwise I'm not going to be able to catch the train."
"Yes I want you to bloody come in!" I shouted. "You know I want you to come in! I'm suppose to finish at 2 and you want me to finish at 6. I do have a life outside of work, you know; hard as it may be to believe."
"You've got plans then?"
As far as I was concerned, I did have plans. Going home and nursing my hangover, to me, was a plan and a much better plan than staying at work and nursing my hangover.
"I had an afternoon off at the weekend (something of a rarity, in case you hadn't noticed); of course I had plans."
"Ah," Max said, knowingly. "Asprin and a nice warm blanket, before starting the cycle again tonight?"
I snorted, a little in anger and a little in amusement, but mainly because it seemed in keeping with my general demeanor.
"My reputation precedes me," I said. "Look, can't you just come in? I feel like crap."
"You've got a day off tomorrow," Max yawned.
"I do at the moment," I laughed. "You'll probably decide you're not going to come in and Maddy'll call me up and say I have to work."
"That won't happen!" Max said. "Look, I'm going to phone Maddy and let her know what's going on."
"What that you're coming in so I can leave at 2?"
"Very funny."
I sighed, trying to calm myself. Then the anger burst out of me again.
"You're a peach, Max," I said, enunciating almost every second syllable, like some over-trained actor. "A real peach. You know that? I hope you know that, buddy."
"Calm down," he said. "It's not so bad a job."
I didn't say anything.
The dialtone started.
I slammed the phone back into the cradle, imagining it was a particularly sensitive part of Max's body.
"Motherfucker," I muttered.
The cafe was typically empty. The wooden floor (which only I seemed too bothered about sweeping and mopping, Max opting to save such ceremonies for "special occasions"), was spotless, owing mainly to the fact that I closed the night before and I hadn't had a customer yet. The few tables were pristine, except for one that was at slightly less of a right-angle than I would have liked. I sighed and walked over, adjusting it accordingly before looking out of the window (which encompassed the entire northern wall) at the empty street. The sun hit the stone in a way I thought would have been quite artistic if I wasn't in a town I regarded (and still do) and the most mundane place on the planet.
I ambled over to the coffee machine and made myself a cappuccino which, after working in coffee shops for longer than I had ever intended, was second nature to me.
Put coffee in holder.
Lock holder in machine.
Put cup under holder.
Press the button.
Put milk in jug.
Put steamer arm in milk.
Turn lever.
Wait for milk to heat and thicken.
Turn lever the other way.
Pour milk into cup.
Repeat depending on the amount of orders you have.
I thought about all of the training the company had paid for me to have and how all that training had really encompassed was heating milk. My manager, Maddy, readily admitted that I didn't really need the training but "It wouldn't hurt". Annoyed at the condescending tone of the "expert" I lost my concentration and burned my forearm on the milk steamer. Maddy had been wrong. It did hurt.
The phone rang and I grabbed it.
"Hello, Maddy," I sighed.
"How did you know it was me?" she laughed.
"Well, it was either you or the president of Penguin Books phoning to tell me that they'd read 'Endless Tides' and wanted to publish my next book and give me a ridiculous sum of money for it, but, then I remembered that he was going to get back to me sometime next week. Thusly, by process of elimination (elimination, in your case, probably not being the worst thing in the world) I deducted that it was you."
There was a pause.
"I didn't get any of that," Maddy said in that voice that had an aversion to saying "T"s.
"Don't worry about it," I sighed at the thought of wasting quite a good rant. "How can I help?"
"You've spoken to Max?" she asked.
"I spoke," I said. "Judging by the outcome of the conversation he either wasn't listening or didn't hear. But I suppose we could be said to have spoken."
"Uh... okay. So you know he's not coming in?"
"I am all too aware."
"It's a good idea the two of you had," she said. "That's the sort of thinking Ellen likes to see."
"Indeed," I said in a voice that transformed the actual meaning of the word into 'Of course she does. Who wouldn't like me to work on my own so that they could line their own pockets with money that has been earned exclusively down to my hard work.'
"Well," Maddy said. "As long as you're okay with it."
I didn't say anything.
The dialtone started.
I slammed the phone back into the cradle imagining it was something that Maddy really cared about. You know, like a vase handed down her family through generations or one of her kids' faces.
"Motherfucker..." I muttered.
I'd been open almost an hour and I still hadn't had a customer. Now, I'm what has always been referred to as a 'hard worker' but it's pretty hard to live up to that when there's no work to be done. I'd already done the weekly cleaning (which in my case was more like the daily cleaning) and I'd just spent half an hour organising the CVs that people had handed in into alphabetical order, gender and age, photocopying each one so there three copies in order for me to see which order I liked the most.
"The next person who hands a CV in can have my job," I muttered, placing all three filing systems next to the till.
Although a hard worker, I always made it a point of honour never to take work too seriously, if only for the fact that I have better things to do with my time. As such, I like to keep my mobile phone on me just in case, and this is really a shot in the dark, someone vaguely interesting wants to get in touch with me. What can I say? I'm all about making the day go quicker.
It just so happened, at that moment, I got a phone call from someone I deemed (and, to this day, deem) one of the most interesting people on the planet.
"Hello, Lilly," I said with a smile.
"Hello, stranger," she said in that voice that was half-way between cutesey and sarcastic. "What are you up to?"
"I'm at work, or in Hell. It's hard to tell the difference. Which is the one with the red guy who carries the pitchfork?"
She laughed. "That would be Hell. I believe his name's Satan."
I smiled. "Satan? No, this guy's Stan. I think he has high blood pressure. As for the pitchfork, I can only assume he's one of my more rural customers."
She laughed again, then we shared a silence that only the best of friends can comfortably share.
"It's dead here," I eventually said. "Come for a coffee."
"I can't," she sighed. "I have work in half an hour."
"Better be quick then," I joked. "How is work?"
"Don't try and be funny with me, stranger," she growled, but I knew she wasn't angry at me. "You know perfectly well how work is."
"Do I now, brother?" I laughed, partly at the way she was trying to butt heads with me and partly at amount of inflections I'd put in the sentence.. 'Brother' was just one of the myriad in-jokes we had. "What's so bad about it over there?"
Judging by the strange noise she made I guess she was trying not to laugh.
"You know what's wrong with it," she said. "I hate it. I just hate it. Spending all my day waiting for customers to walk in. I hate it."
"Tell me what that's like," I laughed. "Sorry, Lilly, but I didn't quite catch the sentiment in that sentence. I get the feeling that you hate it, but you didn't say outright..."
"Do you have to antagonise every situation?"
I shrugged, before remembering she couldn't see me.
"How is Aunt Agonise, these days?" I asked in the accent I always imagined Holden Caulfield as speaking in.
She laughed, then she sighed. "I have to go."
"Okay," I said. "Chin up though, yeah?"
"Yeah," she said. "I'll see you next week."
I smiled. "That's what you said last week and the one before that, if my memory serves me correctly."
"I'm working all the time in a job I hate," she said. "It's not easy."
"You're not the only person who hates their job," I said suggestively.
"Really now, brother? Well, I mean it this week. I want to see you."
"We'll see," I said. "You'll feel differently when you actually see me, I'm sure."
"Oh, definitely," she laughed.
We said "bye" and we both hung up.
It's at this point that I'd like the reader to remember that I opened at 10am. It was now 13:30 and my first customer came in. They were the upper end middle-aged and the upper end of middle-class and the type of customer I tended to get in our 'artisan' coffee shop. He gave me a look I was used to (the kind of look that told me he didn't approve of the length of my hair...) and walked over to the till.
"I'll have a Flat White," he said.
Having been a barista for over a year by that point, it was my professional opinion (and still is, I hasten to add) that anyone who ordered a Flat White was, for the very act of ordering a Flat White, an arsehole. Add into the mix that he didn't even say 'hello', 'please' or, when I gave him his change, ' thank you' and you have something a little stronger than my usual disdain for the customers.
I made it for him and took it to his table. He didn't thank me for that either. When I got back to the coffee machine I muttered, under my breath, "Motherfucker..."
It was just about that time when my anger reached it's high point and I wrote this note for Max:
'Dear Max,
Thank you so much for deciding to let me work today, you absolute
I hope staying at home wasn't to straining!!!! You didn't pull a muscle putting your feet up on the sofa, did you? I hope not. Because you're going all of your leg muscles to run from me and the axe I'm going to be holding the very next time I see you.
Incidently, when are you moving back in with your parents? Soon isn't it? And why did you have to move back in? Was it because you couldn't pay the rent on your old place by any chance? Have you considered working more hours as opposed to less? For some reason, and I can't quite work it out, but when I work more hours my pay cheque is bigger. Now, I'm not saying that the two are related, but maybe you could try it one month and maybe we'll have more evidence? Just a thought.
I have to go now because somebody (read: me/myself/I) has to sweep and mop the floor which, despite it being part of your job, you seem incapable of doing.
Enjoy breathing while you still have a body to keep up the habit.
All my murderous, vengeance-filled hatred,
Sam
"Excuse me," a quiet voice said from the direction of the till.
"Motherfucker," I growled under my breath and continued to sign off my note.
"Excuse me," it said again.
"What?" I growled, spinning around to face them.
It was a guy a little younger than me with hope in his eyes and a love of life yet to be extinguished by working in catering or hospitality.
"I just came to hand my CV in," he said.
I smiled, thinking of how perfect he was. How he could do with a good soul-crushing and how this job was the perfect catalyst for it.
"You're hired," I said. "I'm leaving."
I looked at the clock. It was almost 2pm.
Tuesday 16 April 2013
Endless Tides
So, my first blog post. I suppose, like all strapping (read: more-than-slightly-effeminate) young men, I should state my intentions from the outset, lest I be discovered for my true self later on... let's be honest, it wouldn't be the first time.
I'm twenty and a few months ago I had my first book published. It's a Fantasy novel called 'Endless Tides' and, when people ask what it's about, I tend to look pensively into the distance while I think of something profound to say. Usually I come up short, scratch the back of my head, meet their look again and say "It's kind of a Fantasy 'Catcher in the Rye'" which is both arrogant and untrue. It's a book about one man's quest for peace in a time of war. He's an infamous soldier in the employ of the Thieronian army and, when his nation is threatened by war on two fronts, he is charged with saving his nation. But, to Captain Laike Skyheart of Thieron's Division Four, it doesn't sound like much of an adventure... and therein in the adventure lies.
My second book, 'In the Footsteps of the Behemoth', is due to be published this year. I won't give too much away about that just yet, but keep your eyes peeled.
When I'm not writing or daydreaming, I sometimes find the time to go to work in a coffee shop that fuels my general disdain of the rat race and the human race as a whole (okay, some of the customers are okay, but I don't want to talk about the weather all day. What can I say? I don't depend on the sun to ripen my corn harvest.). I'm something of a musician. What that 'something' is I'm not entirely sure and, judging by the confused faces of most of the audience, neither are they. I've also a penchant for boots and cavalry jackets.
In the following posts you can expect updates, pithy observations on everyday life and maybe even a short story or two. Who knows? Lets just see where the breeze takes us.
I'm twenty and a few months ago I had my first book published. It's a Fantasy novel called 'Endless Tides' and, when people ask what it's about, I tend to look pensively into the distance while I think of something profound to say. Usually I come up short, scratch the back of my head, meet their look again and say "It's kind of a Fantasy 'Catcher in the Rye'" which is both arrogant and untrue. It's a book about one man's quest for peace in a time of war. He's an infamous soldier in the employ of the Thieronian army and, when his nation is threatened by war on two fronts, he is charged with saving his nation. But, to Captain Laike Skyheart of Thieron's Division Four, it doesn't sound like much of an adventure... and therein in the adventure lies.
My second book, 'In the Footsteps of the Behemoth', is due to be published this year. I won't give too much away about that just yet, but keep your eyes peeled.
When I'm not writing or daydreaming, I sometimes find the time to go to work in a coffee shop that fuels my general disdain of the rat race and the human race as a whole (okay, some of the customers are okay, but I don't want to talk about the weather all day. What can I say? I don't depend on the sun to ripen my corn harvest.). I'm something of a musician. What that 'something' is I'm not entirely sure and, judging by the confused faces of most of the audience, neither are they. I've also a penchant for boots and cavalry jackets.
In the following posts you can expect updates, pithy observations on everyday life and maybe even a short story or two. Who knows? Lets just see where the breeze takes us.
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