Emotional Investment

From The Write Practice, prompt is about emotional investment (http://thewritepractice.com/what-is-the-emotional-investment-in-your-stories/)


I can't believe this is actually happening. I've just been invited to join the game, and that's a first. Some of the boys play football during recess. I often stand off to the side and watch, but today is different. Kevin looked over at me and asked if I wanted to play. Does this mean I'm part of his group now?

Kevin has intimidated me for a long time. Not that he's trying to. I'm not sure he's known I existed until today. Kevin has a loud, commanding voice. The leather-looking jacket he wears adds to his swagger. Wherever you see him at school, he's in charge. That's completely foreign to me, and it's scary.

But maybe that's changed now. I walk onto the field and try to find the right place. The trouble is, I've watched football on TV, but have never actually played it. Not even a pick-up game like this. Since I'm on Kevin's team, maybe he'll tell me what to do.

Time for the first play. The other boys must assume I know what I'm doing. Bad idea. Kevin is our quarterback, of course, and he's getting ready to take the snap. I've seen this move on TV where one of the players runs behind the quarterback, then down the field. I decide to do that.

Kevin gets the ball and the play starts. I make my move, doing that cool end-run thing I've seen. Except Kevin doesn't know I'm going to do that, and I run smack into him. Fumble. Somebody on the other team dives on the ball, and it's all my fault.

And then it's over. Kevin shouts at me to get out of the game. I'm dismissed. If I mattered to him at all for a minute or two, I certainly don't now. Walking off the field, crying, I feel a crushing emptiness. Recess is far from over, and I'm alone. I find a quiet spot near the school building and wait for it to end. I wish someone had seen what had happened, someone would tell me it's okay. There's none of that, though, like it never happened. I feel small and insignificant.

Friday Flash Fiction: Worst.Vacation. EVER.

1 March prompt from The One-Minute Writer (oneminutewriter.blogspot.com). Text of prompt from website: Write a very short story / scene in which your protaganist is on vacation. They lose their passport, and are arrested for something. Possibly they don't even speak the local language. Ruh-roh! Hilarity and calmity ensues.

I swear it was in my bag right before I got off the plane. When I got to the counter, though, no amount of rooting around in the bag would produce my passport. Not a good way to start off. The immigration agent frowned at me and muttered something under her breath. I couldn’t make it out, but I’m pretty sure it was swearing. She called another agent over. They had a rapid-fire conversation in their language, then the new guy escorted me down the hall to some offices.

An agent in there actually spoke English. Sort of. I explained my situation and that I wanted to speak with someone from the U.S. Embassy. He said he’d make the call, but getting help could take hours. Would I mind waiting in the room next to his office? Fair enough.

Once settled in the room, I started feeling shaky. This could ruin the whole trip! I needed a smoke. At least I had the pack I’d bought at O’Hare airport; it was probably worth about as much as a new passport. I lit up and started to relax.

But not for long. Soon three men in uniforms burst into the room and began shouting at me. What they were shouting, I don’t know. I stood up and started to reply. Okay, maybe I was shouting too. One of them gestured to a sign behind me. “No Fumar”. What was that? I turned back around and made a gesture of my own, and in the process I accidentally flung my cigarette right into the officer’s hair. That little fire didn’t take long to put out, but before I knew it I was on the floor in handcuffs.

I don’t think I’ve ever left an airport quicker when traveling. Wouldn’t recommend the procedure, though, with all the police officers, emotion, and general humiliation. The two officers kept an angry-sounding dialog going on the ride over to the jail. The officer riding shotgun kept patting his head and scowling at me. That patch of hair still smelled a little burnt, but didn’t look that bad. I thought all the hostility was a bit overdone.

Clang! The holding cell I was in now had four other occupants, and they didn’t look happy to see me. One of them, a huge guy with long, stringy black hair, stood up and walked toward me. I wondered if I could punch him hard enough to have any effect at all, since he probably had six inches and a hundred pounds on me. I was just starting to make a fist when he spoke.

“You wouldn’t happen to speak English, would you?”

I stared up at his face, barely able to see his eyes through the hair. Then it occurred to me I should speak.

“Um, yeah, I’m from Chicago. How come you’re in here?”

He explained that he was a bass player in a band that had come down here to play a few shows. A fellow bass player, how about that? At the hotel bar this evening there had been a slight misunderstanding about the tab, followed by yelling, threats, broken furniture, and his arrest. The band’s manager was trying to post bail, but it was taking forever. The police had his passport, anyway, so he wasn’t leaving the country soon. I kept wondering who had my passport, and where that embassy official was.

The other two detainees turned out to be more drunk than mean, and they didn’t bother us. I sat down with my new friend Ivan and we started comparing notes about our favorite bands. It turned out that we had much in common, down to the songs we knew. Ivan mentioned they had a show booked for the next night, and wondered if they’d have to cancel.

I’m not sure how much time had passed, but I heard the main lock-up door open down the hall. Soon a man with a jail guard escort stopped at our cell. He called my name and I walked over to the bars. Good news! My passport had been found on the airplane and was now at the embassy. The cigarette fracas was a little more delicate. It appeared that no charges would be filed, though. The police wanted to know where I was staying and for how long, but otherwise I was free to go.

Ivan came over as the guard was starting to unlock the cell door. He borrowed pen & paper from the embassy official and wrote out a name and phone number. That was the band’s manager, Ivan said, and I needed to call him right away. If Ivan couldn’t get out in time, maybe I could fill in for him at tomorrow’s show? If I wanted to, that is. And I did!

Walking out of the building, I thought perhaps this vacation wasn’t totally wrecked after all. That was before I discovered there was a polka convention at my hotel, with several accordion players in adjoining rooms practicing day and night. I shudder every time I think about it.