Barista - Chapters Eleven and Twelve

11

 

Eric woke at three in the morning. He’d been dreaming what could be a great story. It was about a woman who…

Who…

Who…

Was it a woman or a man…

Ah, fuck.

Like that, the dream was gone.

Damn, it had been good. Whatever it was.

He tried going back to sleep but his eyes took a ridiculous interest in the ceiling and didn’t stop looking at it for an hour. Until finally he wrote off the night’s sleep and got out of bed. Since he was up anyway, he started his laptop and sat on the sofa in the living room. If he was awake, he might as well be writing.

Except he couldn’t write.

So he did the one thing he swore he’d never do again.

He went online and searched for writing tips.

He’d given this bad habit up a long time ago. It was easy to inundate yourself with advice, most of it conflicting, and be tempted to follow the latest new tip, which invariably was a repackaged old idea that had been around for decades.

Write your book in 28 days.

Write your book in 1 week.

Write your book in 10 hours.

Let our computer program write your book for you. Just send us the names of your characters, a rough outline including climax, and general ideas about the series and we’ll…

He wished he’d thought of developing software that could write books for people. The firm that created it probably wouldn’t be around too long, but he knew they’d make a ton of money short-term off newbs.

Not getting anywhere, he decided to be productive and check email. Because he got so much of it between the hours of midnight and four in the morning.

A message from John. It included the proposed agenda for the conference this weekend and five separate instances of John thanking him.

Good news—both your panels were expanded to two hours and there will be a workshop at the end of the plotting session, which would be great if you could…

Eric groaned. Under normal circumstances he didn’t salivate over the idea of membering on a panel. But doing it right now, when he’d apparently forgotten how to write a book, would be kind of fraudulent.

He owed christie17 a response. He fired off a quick one, hinting around the fact he was blocked but kept the message otherwise impersonal. Getting involved with a fan was a bad idea…but then he found himself re-reading her earlier email. He was tempted to write her back again and share more but he wisely stopped himself.

He couldn’t do that. It was a telltale sign of desperation.

“You’ve been working too hard,” he said.

But the bills were piling up and sales were sliding and he’d already missed a deadline. Which meant he wasn’t working hard enough.

12

 

Meredith went to the gym for the first time in three months. She wasn’t in college anymore and couldn’t eat whatever she wanted. She’d developed this stubborn tiny gut that wasn’t going away.

Since it was her first time back and she’d never been an exercise nut, she decided to take it easy. The treadmill terrified her, the elliptical required coordination she didn’t naturally possess, and she saw this other cardio machine that was a cross between a stepper and a treadmill, which she didn’t even know how to operate.

So the bike it was.

Exercise sucked, but she’d wisely brought her headphones so she could listen to an audiobook through her phone. She scrolled through her library. Nothing jumped out at her until—

The Dead Ones by Eric Hanlon.

It was his first book and she’d given it three stars. It was the perfect book for the stationary bike: she already knew the story and characters and being a thriller wouldn’t require much critical thinking.

She sat down and started pedaling and hit PLAY.

“The Dead Ones. Chapter One. I hit the pavement. And the pavement hit back. A lot harder than I could.”

She hit STOP and went back to the beginning.

“The Dead Ones. Chapter One.”

She hit STOP again.

It was Eric’s voice.

He’d done his own audio narration? She’d read the book originally and must have gotten this audio file through a package deal.

Self-published authors were notoriously bad at doing their own narration. They usually skimped on sound equipment to save a buck. People also assumed (incorrectly) that good writers made good speakers, but the two skills did not always overlap. To be a good narrator, you had to be an actor of sorts, slipping in and out of various roles as the story progressed.

Having talked to him twice now, Meredith suspected Eric would make for a horrible narrator. He was abrupt and kind of awkward, except of course when Alana presented him with a big pair of tits and flirted ridiculously.

Perversely, she looked forward to hearing how awful his reading was going to be.

~~~

“Hey, do you want these?” Alana held out her pack of cigarettes. “I’m quitting.”

“For real this time?”

Alana flipped her off. “Do you want them?”

It was a nice day, warm for early March. And it was Dan’s day off. He’d scheduled a one-on-one with her for tomorrow, which would be as fun as a root canal. But at least today he wouldn’t be looking over her shoulder and criticizing everything she did.

Meredith was about to take the cigarettes but stopped herself. “You know what, I’ve been good today so no thanks.”

Alana did a double-take. “Uh-oh. What exactly does that mean?”

Meredith felt a blush coming on. She didn’t like talking about dieting or what her body looked like. All her friends over the years had done it, many to the point of obsession. But she’d never understood why and it had always made her feel self-conscious.

“Oh, nothing.”

“Don’t oh, nothing me,” Alana said. “What are you doing, a cleanse or something?”

“God no!” Meredith said. “I exercised this morning and am going to try out a new diet I think.”

“Oh-my-god-why? You’re hot.”

This was all part of the dialog. Woman declared she was going on a diet, her incredulous friends assured her it wasn’t necessary, woman had to justify why she was dieting…it was all so fake. She hated fake.

“Thanks,” she said and left it at that.

“So let me get this straight: diet, exercise—are you going shopping today or tomorrow also?”

Meredith frowned. “It has been awhile since I bought myself anything ni—”

“Who is he?” Alana said.

“Who is who?”

“Mer, it’s me. Alana. Your best friend slash co-worker ever, maybe not exactly in that order but close enough. Who is he?”

Meredith shook her head. “Why does everything we do have to be about guys? Why can’t I just be taking care of myself because it’s good for me?”

Alana held out her palms. “Okay, okay. Just asking a harmless question.”

“Your questions are never harmless.”

Alana smiled. “Guilty as charged. So, hey, can you drive this weekend?”

“This weekend?”

“To the conference in Allentown?”

Meredith gave her an incredulous look. “Ha-ha. Very funny.”

“You’re backing out on me?”

“In order to back out, I would have needed to be going in the first place.”

“Mer…”

She shook her head. “I’m not going. Besides, he’s going to be there.”

“Eric?” Alana smiled.

“No, not him! He’s all yours. My ex.”

“And that’s why you should go. Do you know how easily you could pick up a guy at this thing? You work in a bookstore, they’ll love you.”

“No, they won’t. They’ll think I’m an obsessive fan girl.”

“Not if you do it the right way. And there will never be a greater opportunity to say screw you to Damian, than by showing up at the conference where he’s headlining, looking all sexy, and hooking up with some guy.”

Meredith hated to say it, but Alana might have been right.

Still, she tried to argue. “But if I have to say screw you to Damian, I’m telling him I still like him.”

Alana shook her head. “No, you’re not.”

“I kind of am.”

Alana tried a different tack. “You know I’m the best wing girl out there. It’s just like pairing people up with books. I’ll find ten suitable guys for you in an hour.”

Meredith hated to say this too, but it was beginning to sound like a lot of fun.

“So…can you drive?” Alana asked.

“This was your idea.” Meredith’s car was on its last legs. Every day still running was a blessing. “Why can’t you?”

“I kind of, sort of, maybe got a DWI last night.”

“Kind of?” Meredith wasn’t surprised.

Alana held out a palm. “God’s honest truth here, okay?”

“Okay.”

“I met some friends at the bar and got carried away. I knew better than to drive, but I had to get out of the bar or I’d just keep drinking. So I had this great idea.”

“Which was?”

“Sleep it off in my car for a couple hours. And that’s what I did. And they said I was driving while intoxicated.”

“How?”

“It was cold as hell last night, so I got in my car and turned it on to keep warm while I slept it off. So you see, I wasn’t driving.”

Classic Alana.