Writing by Committee Episode 19—No Desk. #writing #creative #sci-fi #fiction
The stream is coming! Seth meets Sloan... Grace and Sean talk babies....

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Writing by Committee Episode 19—No Desk. #writing #creative #sci-fi #fiction
The stream is coming! Seth meets Sloan... Grace and Sean talk babies....
Writing by Committee Episode 17—Lull. #writing #creative #sci-fi #fiction
The stream is coming....
Writing by Committee Episode 15—Stranger Things. #writing #creative #sci-fi #fiction
Oh yeah! Here we go again.....live in five.
Writing by Committee Episode 13—Hello? #writing #creative #sci-fi #fiction
Coming to you live in five!
Writing by Committee Episode 13—Hello? #writing #creative #sci-fi #fiction
We’re back in black today. Sorry about last week’s technical spazout which prevented us from being able to stream. Oh, the internet!
Writing by Committee Episode 12—Driving. #writing #creative #sci-fi #fiction
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Joins us again tomorrow at 12:00 noon EST
Writing by Committee Episode 11.5—Mean to Me. #writing #creative #sci-fi #fiction
The stream is coming. For real.
Baseball on Mars - June 23, 2016
Grace looked at her phone, scrolling through the email messages from this morning until she came to one from Peter Quay addressed to All Colonial Gardens Staff, with the subject heading: Noon Press Conference.
Grace had never been good at checking email. She got so many of them, and very few pertained directly to her and, of the ones that were actionable, most would would take care of themselves if she ignored them for twenty-four hours. Freedom from email was another reason she preferred working in the gardens to sitting behind a desk. P. Quay knew this about her and always pinged her directly with anything urgent. Grace scanned the email and learned that Abrams’ had put in a last-minute request to use the Colonial Gardens for a press conference today and the mayor’s office had shepherded it through the fast track.
Whatever Abram’s announcement was, it must be huge to have the support of Mayor Camacho behind it. More reporters had arrived now, gathering under the awning to smoke a quick cigarette and checking their phones, while several members of her staff finished setting up the folding chairs. Camera crews from all the major television news station laid cables between the raised beds and connected them to microphones mounted on a podium.
Abrams stood to the side with his retinue, speaking in low tones. From where Grace was standing she had an unobstructed view of him. The man was an abomination of all the latest cosmetic modifications, even more so in person than on screen. Besides his insanely florid hair extensions, he had also undergone a shoulder lift, which made him appear perpetually non-plussed. “Whatever,” his posture seemed to say. The popular pigmentation enhancements that made supermodels seem more verdant and alive than ordinary humans fell flat on Abrams. He looked like a leggy petunia badly in need of water.
Among the messages on Grace’s phone was a text from Sean. “Meeting may run late tonight. Raincheck on dinner?” And then a second text, “How’s your day going?”
By now, Grace was accustomed to Sean’s unpredictable schedule. It was just the nature of his work, but when they had first started dating, she resented being stood up all the time. The main reason she started listening to the radio had been to pass the time while she waited for him to pick her up, or text or call to say why he was late. Now it didn’t bother her so much. Today she couldn’t have been more thrilled to hear he would be home late. That meant she’d have time to tune in to the broadcast and find out what had happened at Wrigley. Knowing now that the date of the broadcast had been April first, she was more sure than ever that it was nothing more than a practical joke, an Orson Wells’ ‘War of the Worlds’ thing. Otherwise, there would have been some mention of it in the Old Earth Archives. Still, she couldn’t shake how disturbing it was to hear and entire stadium of people fall silent like that. Surely that couldn’t be faked, so it must have been a pre-recorded gag.
Grace opened Sean’s text and replied, “Abrams called press conference outside West Dome. Media swarm. WTF?”
When he didn’t reply right away, she powered the phone down and slipped it back into her pocket. He was probably in meetings and wouldn’t get her message for several hours. She didn’t take his lack of responsiveness personally, but it didn’t do much to sell her on the prospect of raising a child together. With Sean working twelve and fourteen hour days, most of the responsibility would fall to her, and she wasn’t sure she wanted to give up her life just yet.
There was a flurry of activity from the press as Abrams stepped up to the podium. Those who hadn’t taken their seats, crushed their cigarettes underfoot and rushed to do so now. A dozen cameras went off at once, their multi-color flashes turning the grim atmosphere in the tunnel into a pyrotechnics show. So many of the alternative media sites these days used color spectrometry to attract viewers of particular political persuasion that it was easy to see a news outlet’s bias at a glance.
“Members of the press,” Abrams began. “In the last forty-eight hours, a team of deep gravity divers working on repairs to the Aleutian Canal have discovered the remains of an ancient spacecraft, which we believe to be the wreckage of Mayflower51.”
A gasps of disbelief rose from the crowd as the cameras continued to go off. Of the several thousand colonial ships that left Old Earth, Mayflower51 was the first one to arrive safely on a habitable planet, withstanding warp travel across hundreds of light years, and entering Ambit’s orbit with all souls on board alive and well. It was the same ship, Grace’s great great grandmother had been on, long thought to be lost to the ages, but now rediscovered. This was a big announcement indeed as it would mean that scientists could begin to unravel many of the technological mysteries that had been lost during the Dark Ages that immediately followed colonization. This would mean huge advances for her work in the Colonial Gardens, and was probably why Abrams had chosen this spot for his announcement.
“We at Abrams Industries are proud to be at the center of such an historic discovery, which will greatly enrich humanity’s scientific and cultural understanding of our past and help propel us to a brighter future.”
The reporters began shouting questions, vying for attention from Abrams, but he raised his arms to quiet them.
“My team is working around the clock to ascertain the condition of the ship and its contents. Preliminary video footage of the site indicates extensive damage to a portion of the ship, but I can tell you now that yesterday at twenty-one hundred hours, a team recovered the ship’s warp drive, which appears to be intact.”
The reporters erupted into chaos, rising from their seats and shouting at once so that Grace couldn’t make out a single word of what was said.
“Please!” Abrams said. “I don’t have time to field your questions now, but rest assured, we will be releasing more detailed information as it becomes available.”
With that, Abrams turned and walked from the podium, making his way along the outside of the tunnel in the rain, accompanied by two of his security guards.
Sarah Joan’s Town - June 23, 2016
Seventy miles out of New Orleans, Molly L'Amant, steered her 1983 Corolla down an unmarked dirt road. Spanish moss slapped at her windows from either side as her balding tires slipped and slid through patches of mud, despite slowing to a crawl. Her headlights, already dim, became more and more useless as they became covered in muck. She squinted through her glasses, the trees and the road growing indistinct and ominous in the growing dusk—surely there’d be some lights by now. A trail of taillights to follow and a bright and welcoming tent at the end of this road. As she drove further and further into the bayou, she felt more and more certain that she’d taken a wrong turn. She wrung the steering wheel with sweaty fists and as she did, she felt her left arm spasm—a shock of pain running from her fingertips to her elbow, leaving her muscles weak and trembling.
“Shit,” she muttered, letting go of the wheel with her left hand and trying to shake the numbness out of her arm. The heat, the stress of driving, the fight with Grace were all causing her MS to flare up like a fucker. She should have just turned the car around the moment she saw this scab in the landscape that they called a road and headed to her mother’s.
She shook her head at herself for even being here, miles from civilization where a dazzling New Orleans urbanite like herself could get raped by a gator or eaten by a family of Cajun Crackers. But Patty Godot had raved about this revival, said that this white girl was the real thing, that she’d felt God walking among them, that she’d felt reborn after, a child of the human race. Yeah, Molly thought to herself, the touch of a white girl might just clear up Patty’s clap too, so long as she chased it with a full course of antibiotics after.
The whine of the cicadas drown out her sputtering, wheezing engine but the air was otherwise still and thick. Through the undergrowth, she spotted a flash of light. Headlight, porchlight or flashlight, it was proof that there was at least one other human being at the end of this road, so she coaxed a bit more speed out of her poor car.
She and Grace had planned on coming here together that night. They’d met at a gay singles mixer at First Covenant Baptist two years before and both had been raised in the faith. First Covenant was only Baptist in name, having split from the main church years ago, they might as well have been Unitarians. She supposed that they both wanted something more visceral, something transcendent, a faith that demanded more of them than a contribution to the monthly potluck.
Tonight, Grace had announced to Molly that rather than looking for transcendence at the revival, she’d seek it in Patty’s bed. Molly didn’t stay in the apartment for long after that, stalking out and tearing away in her car the moment Grace uttered the words “open relationship.” She’d decided to come to the revival because she didn’t have anyplace else to go.
She drove into a clearing and almost rear ended a parked car. It wasn’t a parking lot and there didn’t seem to be rhyme or reason to the arrangement, so she pulled into an empty corner the furthest away from the mean looking bog at the edge of the packed dirt. The light she’d seen seemed to be a bonfire. It was a ways up a narrow trail and on top of a low hill. Through the screen of trees, Molly made out dark silhouettes against the fire.
God damn, it looked like some Voodoo ritual shit going on up there, not an ol’ time revival. Yet tacked to the trees at regular intervals were signs carefully printed on purple poster board, written in sparkle puffy paint and sprinkled with bright confetti: “The Flame of Our Lord, Sarah Joan Clarke. All Are Welcome.” The juxtaposition was disquieting at the least, yet gave her enough reassurance that she was in the right place that she could leave her car behind.
Walking through the sopping ground and looking up the hill toward the fire, mud seeping into her flats, Molly felt uncomfortable. Late to the party. She was the only one there in the makeshift lot, and that loneliness pressed her onward. She felt that if she stood still, the serpents would crawl out of the mud and wind themselves around her legs, dragging her back into the dark water.
She walked the path, her dripping shoes in hand. As she started uphill the path became dry, dusty and criss crossed with thick gnarled roots. She stubbed her toe, bit back an expletive. It was so quiet. The vague human shadows resolved themselves against the light, but she couldn’t hear anything from them. The bayou seemed to consume the sound of the bonfire and everything around it, she didn't dare break that silence.
The hill was steeper than it looked so that nearing the top, she had to use her hands to pull herself up, grasping roots and limbs. Her own breath was loud in her ears, her senses were filled with the harsh tang of burning green wood. She slipped and fell to her knees, tearing her jeans before she finally crested the hill and came to the congregation.
The fire was so bright, and Molly’s glasses were now covered in grit, so Sarah Joan Clarke’s audience never became anything more than shadows. She could see was that they were mostly barefoot, spattered in mud up to the knee and red with dust everywhere else. Molly looked down at herself and saw that she looked the same. They stood in a semicircle, or sat on nearby logs. Each of them rapt, facing the fire.
She had this creeping sensation, like all these folks had just been sitting there, maybe for hours, waiting in perfect silence for Molly to arrive. It made her skin crawl, as if the serpents had slipped down the back of her blouse and were running their cold, dry bellies down her spine. Her mouth was dry, like she’d supped on the dust from the path. She stopped just short of the bonfire’s light and warmth, shivering a little. Perhaps a god waited in that fire, but Molly doubted that it was her God.
The silence was broken by a gentle chord played on an acoustic guitar, then a high clear voice began to sing.
There are loved ones in the glory,
Whose dear forms you often miss;
When you close your earthly story,
Will you join them in their bliss?
Will the circle be unbroken
By and by, by and by?
Is a better home awaiting
In the sky, in the sky?
Molly knew “Will the Circle Be Unbroken” of course, had sung it countless times along with countless choruses at a dozen churches since she was a child. She’d always heard it sung loud and joyous, a gospel anthem to the promise of heaven and family. But she’d never heard it like this before. Slow, almost halting, and with a deep sadness as if the young woman singing it had seen those most beloved to her die, and was begging the Lord Himself to be reunited with them.
Now Molly saw her. Sarah Joan Clarke, sat on a stool atop a small, roughly constructed platform on the far side of the fire. Mostly in shadow, her face was nonetheless illuminated in flickering shades of orange and yellow, a curtain of sparks seemed to engulf her and raise her up as she sang.
Her song filled the air like the smoke, exploring verses that Molly had never heard before. With a voice both powerful and fragile, Sarah Joan sang of emptiness, as death stripped away every comfort of Earth and replaced it with impossible longing.
All the lost ones, beckon to you
As they rest in His embrace,
In your sorrow, will you join them?
And in leaving, find your grace.
Will the circle be unbroken
By and by, by and by?
Is a better home awaiting
In the sky, in the sky?
The guitar fell silent and Sarah Joan bowed her head. Molly felt tears on her face, hot from the bonfire. During the song, she’d stepped as close as she dared to the flames. Dropping her gaze, she wiped the tears away. Her shoes, which she’d let fall during the song, were in the ashes, the toes smouldering.
Writing by Committee Episode 10- Set it down. #writing #creative #sci-fi #fiction
Today on Writing by Committee: Using setting to convey character change. Plus the latest drama unfolding in Baseball on Mars and Sarah Joan’s Town. Spin up the jump drive and joins us now!
Sarah Joan’s Town - June 21, 2016
From his corner seat at the bar, Seth could see almost the entire casino floor of Wynn. The massive, windowless room with its dizzyingly high ceilings and large-scale chandeliers reminded him of the Children of Christ. When you got right down to it, the two weren’t very different--just a place for poor suckers to come to lay down their money for a chance at salvation, only here you were at least guaranteed a cold beer while you waited. He drained the last of the pint glass in front of him and motioned to the bartender to pour him another. Sloan’s text said to be at the bar at seven. He’d arrived a twenty minutes early so he could sit and have a beer to calm his nerves before she got there. She was the one who suggested they meet here. He wasn’t surprised. The Wynn was off the Strip, and had a reputation for being exclusive--the kind of place that kept the riff-raff out with five-hundred-dollar minimum blackjack tables and high limit poker games taking place behind thick velvet curtains. Even the slot machines were tastefully segregated from the card play, which decreased the frenetic noise you heard in most casinos and made everything seem classier and less stressful, because hemorrhaging money should, above all, be a relaxing experience. The black marble floors, crimson carpet and golden fixtures cast a glow of decadence over everything here. The place oozed sex. It was exactly the place he would have expected Sloan to suggest.
The bartender set the beer down in front of Seth, and he took a careful drink from it, bringing the level down to just below the rim so that Sloan’s first impression of him wouldn’t be watching him slosh beer all over his hand. Despite the hours of phone conversations and the hundreds of texts that had gone between them, he was nervous to finally meet her. She’d seen him on stage and and heard his story at a revival outside of Reno a couple months back. She said she’d had a feeling about him then and wanted to approach him that night, but she was too shy. Sloan got interested in the movement when her mother was diagnosed with cancer. They had attended the event together. Sloan had found his name on the website and then worked up the courage to contact him through social media. It was incredible to him that someone as beautiful as Sloan was would be insecure about anything. She looked like a model in her photos, which he supposed she was. Sometimes girls like that looked bad without makeup, but even in the shots of her with her friends at pajama parties, she was the prettiest girl in the room.
A shout of surprise rose from the nearest craps table where a group had gathered to spur on a high roller. The mob of players and onlookers reacted to each roll of the dice, a single organism, inhaling and exhaling together, as the excitement of the gameplay animated and cohesed them.
“Hi there, handsome,” a female voice to his left said.
Seth turned to see Sloan standing with one hand cocked on her hip, the other raised in a wave. She wore a white silk shirt, pencil skirt and heels. Her dark hair was done up, with a few loose strands framing her face. She looked different than her photos--classier maybe, and more mature, which wasn’t a bad thing, but it put him off-guard for a second.
“He-hey!” He said, nearly choking on the word. “You look...just amazing. You just getting off work or something?” It was a stupid question and he regretted it as soon as he said it. Show girls didn’t wear business-style attire to work. Or at least he didn’t think they did. Thankfully she didn’t seem phased by it.
“I thought we’d grab a bite to eat,” she said. “I made reservations at Sinatra at eight thirty.”
Sinatra was the upscale Italian restaurant at the Wynn. It was way over his price range, but he’d slipped one of Sarah Joan’s credit cards in his wallet while she was in the bathroom. She wouldn’t know he was gone until after tonight’s show, and it would take her and Mother Molly a few weeks to put two-and-two together. They might not even know he had it until the bills came in next month, which meant he’d be enjoying himself to the fullest before they called the bank to report it stolen.
“Sure,” he said. “Have a seat. I’ll buy you a drink.”
She walked over and planted a kiss on his lip. When she drew back, she said, “I was thinking you might rather come up to my room where we can drink in private...and maybe wipe these stupid grins off our faces?”
She smelled like sunblock and coconuts and all of the blood in his body was making a mad dash to his crotch. This was his kind of woman, a real cut-to-the-chase sort.
“Private sounds good to me,” he said.
“Great,” she said and pointed to his beer. “You have some cash to settle up?”
“Yeah,” he reached for his pocket and took out his wallet. He’d withdrawn a couple hundred dollars at the cashier’s window using the stolen card just to see if it would work. Guessing Sarah Joan’s password hadn’t been hard: Matthew621. It was her favorite bible verse and one she quoted often: For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. The bartender was busy with another customer and he only had large bills so he’d have to wait for change.
“Here,” Sloan said, handing him a key card. “Room 1271. You must want to freshen up after your trip. I’ll settle up and meet you in a few.”
He handed her the hundred dollar bill. “Sounds great.”
He hadn’t had time to shower after the marathon fuck fest with Sarah Joan this afternoon, and the long bus ride didn’t help. He slid off the bar stool and walked to the elevators, turning once to get a look at her ass in that tight skirt. It didn’t disappoint.
Writing by Committee Episode 9- What did you say? #writing #creative #sci-fi #fiction
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Baseball on Mars - June 16, 2016
She’d dawdled far too long. Now she really did run like the wind, which was starting to pick up, being corn stalks so far over they looked about to snap. If this kept up, Marjo’s tomato plants wouldn’t stand a chance. Sometimes Grace wondered if Darius wasn’t taking things a bit too far with his weather programs. The sprinkler heads opened up full bore now, sending the rain down in sheets. A sudden blast of wind from the high-powered fans blew a wall of rain in her direction, soaking her t-shirt and plastering it to her chest. Darius was probably at his desk laughing his ass off watching her in the video feed. She flipped him the bird via the nearest surveillance camera as she ran past it, making for the shelter of the lettuce tunnel on the south side of the supply building.
They had erected the tunnel to shade the leafy greens and tender perennials from the artificially enhanced sunlight of the dome, but it also served as a break room and communal meeting space for employees and visitors to the gardens. Sean sometimes met her there for lunch when he needed a respite from the lobbyists that trawled the cafes and parks around the capitol building trying to snatch five minutes of a senator’s time between sessions.
She raced around the last potato bed and entered the tunnel at a dead sprint, not seeing the person standing just inside until the second before she plowed into him.
“Ooof!” Grace said as they collided.
The man must have seen her coming and raised his arms in defense because he managed to catch and hold her in a clumsy bear hug that kept them both from careening into the picnic tables.
When she recovered her footing and looked up to see which one of her employees she’d accidentally taken out, she was shocked and horrified to find the puckered face of Linc Abrams, president and CEO of Abrams Industries, glaring down at her.. A week ago she wouldn’t have known the intergalactic shipping magnate from one of the new interns from the 4-H club, but ever since he’d declared his candidacy for Sean’s senate seat last month, Abrams’ face had been all over the news. He was running against Sean on the conservative ticket and had the endorsement of some of the most prominent real estate developers and business leaders in Ambit. Sean said he wasn’t worried; everyone knew Abrams was a crook and a liar, but Grace wasn’t convinced. Anyone with that much influence over Ambit’s only low-gravity port was no one to be trifled with.
Gathered around Abrams were a gaggle of reporters, including Dolly Markel, the Omega-8 Evening News maven, with two cameramen, reporters from each of the colony’s mainstream newspapers, a photojournalist from Ambit Magazine plus a redheaded dwarf in an oversized Husker Du t-shirt, who was probably a blogger for one of the webloids that covered all-things-scandalous-and-click-baity.
But Abrams, who was still glaring at her from behind his thick hair extensions, didn’t seem interested in releasing her. If anything, he was tightening his grip on her arms. His hostility nodes swelled under the crepey skin of his forebrow. They were unusually erect for a man his age, which must explain why he wore such aggressive hair extensions. They darted around wildly, trying to braid around her own hair while the nodes turned such a vibrant shade of crimson that Grace half expected Abrams to gnash his teeth and start snarling at her.
“I’m terribly sorry,” she said, jerking her head back and forth trying to outmaneuver his hair before it could intertwine with her own. “I didn’t see you standing there.”
The dwarf blogger had stepped forward and thrust his cell phone in Grace’s face and was snapping closeups. The other reporters just stood back and watched dumbfounded. Apparently, Husker Dude was the only one of them to think this scene merited documenting, which made him extra perceptive, or extra obtuse, Grace couldn’t decide which. Either way, she wanted out of Abrams’ embrace, immediately. She wasn’t sure which Tai Kwon Do move she was supposed to use to break his hold; she’d only practice the martial art for a couple years before taking up squash instead. But before she could come up with the right technique, Abrams released her. He stepped back and a robotic smile spread across his face, his hostility nodes disappearing beneath the writhing thicket of his hair.
“Quite a storm,” he said. “But you’re safe under cover now.”
He shot his cuffs, raised his eyebrows and shrugged for the camera as if to say, you never can tell when a beautiful young thing will come out of nowhere and fall into your arms.
Grace pulled her wet t-shirt away from her chest. She’d worn an unlined bra today, and all nine of her nipples were sticking straight out. Abrams seemed to be making a point of keeping his gaze above shoulder level.
Grace cringed at the thought of the images that would appear in the webloids later today. The captions might imply that they were old friends, or maybe even lovers, caught in flagrante. The thought disgusted her, so she put it out of her mind. No one would believe it anyway. Abrams was old enough to be her great grandfather. At least no one had recognized her as Sean’s fiance. It was only a matter of time before that happened of course, but, for now, she was insulated from that side of the campaign. So far Sean had agreed she shouldn’t have to be dragged into the limelight until it was absolutely unavoidable. They didn’t attend political functions together, which was fine because she had no interest in politics. Trying to keep four thousand species of Old Earth plants alive was enough of a challenge.
Still, she couldn’t help wondering what Abrams was doing here in the Gardens. Obviously, he’d brought the media with him, so it must be for some kind of publicity stunt which the sudden storm had put a damper on. None of them looked prepared for the weather. The cameramen were wiping down their equipment and Doopsy’s normally balletic hair dropped around her temples. For the first time today, Grace was glad that Darius was running the weather board.
Abrams turned to say something to his assistant and Grace took the opportunity to disappear. She turned and walked the length of the tunnel. Reaching the supply building airlock, she punched in her access code, but when the door opened, instead of entering, she doubled back behind the irrigation tanks and waited out of sight to see what Abrams was up to. Beyond the tunnel, the storm was still raging, but Marjo’s tomatoes would just have to fend for themselves a little longer.
Sarah Joan’s Town - June 16,2016
Mother Molly held the brush in one hand and the plastic cup filled with liquid latex in the other. Every time she touched the brush tip to Eliza’s cheek, the girl giggled and fidgeted.
“It’s cold,” Eliza said.
Molly dropped the brush into the cup and gripped Eliza’s chin, turning the girl to face her. “I told you to hold still. You keep moving and I’m going to fuck up your face and we’ll have to start all over.”
Eliza rolled her eyes, but then squared her shoulders and let her face go slack in preparation for the next coat of makeup. Molly was down to her last nerve today already and this old age makeup was taking twice as long as it should. Eliza had better sit still or Molly might just beat her silly, stick her in a wheelchair and have her play a car crash paraplegic instead of an old woman with arthritis.
Molly chose Eliza because the girl was a good little actress. She really embodied the parts. And unlike some of the other young people that Molly used for the faith healings, Eliza didn’t begrudge the makeup that made her old or deformed or otherwise ugly. The girl seemed to relish it. Molly was proud to have found her for Sarah Joan—a girl singing in the chorus for the touring company of Hamilton brought into the fold where she could truly make something of herself.
Molly painted thick stripes of the clear latex across Eliza’s lower eyelids. When the stuff dried, it would shrink up, making the skin below it look wrinkled. After that, Molly would put a layer of powder and color on the girl’s face to give her normally healthy, mocha colored skin a slightly chalky complexion. Add a gray wig and the girl could qualify for the senior discount at the IHOP. They could go together, Molly sans makeup. Just a couple old black ladies catching the early bird special.
Molly’s stomach gargled, reminding her that she hadn’t eaten anything that day aside from half a frozen Snickers that she’d snuck out of the Fridgidaire on her way to corral the congregation back onto their busses when Sarah Joan was having her fit. She could still taste it. In fact, there was a bit of a peanut trapped in her bridgework that she kept tonguing, hoping to dislodge it and gain whatever nourishment it could give her.
“So, I have arthritis of the knees,” Eliza said. “Am I going to be in a wheelchair?”
Molly gently stroked the corners of Eliza’s eyes with the brush tip. In 15 minutes, she’d have crow’s feet almost as deep as Molly’s.
She shook her head, her tongue sticking out of the corner of her mouth as she worked. “No. I think you should use the walker. Really take your time with it. You’re old, frail, alone. You begged your children to come with you tonight, but they’re ungrateful heathens. They’ve got no spirit.”
“Just waiting for me to kick so they get the farm,” Eliza grinned, turning her face into a craggy landscape.
“If the Man doesn’t take it first,” Molly added. “Social security don’t pay much anymore.”
Molly enjoyed this part. Making up the stories. Here, it was all off the cuff. But later, she’d write it all down on three by five cards and it’d be the backstory she’d give Sarah Joan. It would be the revelation, transmitted by God to Sarah Joan’s ears, of this poor woman’s tale. The tale of…
“Your name is Olivia Washington and you drove yourself here all the way from Tippington Gorge, three hundred miles away, to receive the healing touch of our Prophet.”
“Praise be,” Eliza responded, without a trace of irony. Despite being invited behind the curtain, despite seeing how Molly made the miracles happen using makeup and stories, the girl still believed, fully and without reservation. Molly admired the girl’s gift for compartmentalization.
Molly still believed too, in her way. She believed that these stores were a necessity. They were the hook that brought people to Sarah Joan, so they could hear the truth. They were the candy coating that hid the medicine that they had to be convinced to hear—that Eden was possible, but only with hard and bitter work. The path that she and Sarah Joan were laying out before the congregation was all razor sharp rocks, and they’d have to take it on their knees.
Besides, Molly had seen Sarah Joan perform more than her fair share of true miracles. Some that kept her awake at night in wonder and others that kept her awake in dread because God is unfathomable and we are but flesh and when the two meet the result is bloody and alien.
Molly shuddered, causing the brush to slip, spattering latex in Eliza’s hair. “Shit,” she muttered, wiping away the mess with a tissue.
No, better to give the public stories. They made for better theater than the real thing.
Writing by Committee Episode 8- Special Edition #writing #creative #sci-fi #fiction
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Sarah Joan’s Town June 6, 2016
Seth sits in the back of the bus, typing on his cell phone the entire ride to the Greyhound station. At intervals, he giggles like a middle school girl, rolling his eyes, and sucking his teeth in response to the messages coming through.
Normally, this blatant self-absorption would annoy me, but Seth and I have never had much to say to each other, and I’m happy to have my thoughts to myself. He’s nice enough to look at but he doesn’t have two brain cells to rub together, and his feet smell like three-day old cat vomit. He stinks up the whole bus when he takes his sneakers off. Sara Joan, of course, is oblivious to it, and she won’t hear any criticism of him. Josh and the rest of the Board can’t understand what Sara Joan sees in Seth, but I do see. I see very well. He’s an innocent, a babe in the woods. He’s everything Sara Joan wishes she could be. I can’t say I understand the demons that drive her to call lambs like Seth to her bed, but I know I can’t fight them. She must do that herself. Somewhere in our leader’s soul a war is raging, and it’s our job to clear the battlefield for the fight, not try to prevent it. I have total faith that she will prevail over her monsters, but that doesn’t make it easy to watch. It doesn’t change the fact that ever since Seth joined us, Sarah Joan has been impossible to deal with—totally unapproachable and short tempered about everything. She doesn’t want to hear about any staffing issues, or the maintenance work that’s needed on the busses. We have plenty of cash in reserve, but she won’t delay the tour for the forty-eight hours it would take to get the parts in and do the work. I admire her commitment to the cause, but how will it serve God if we break down on the highway because of a worn serpentine belt?
Seth snickers over his phone. In the mirror I see his thick thumbs working double-time to craft a reply. I look back at the road and step on the gas. The faster we get to the station, the sooner we can be rid of him. I’m no fool. I know that Seth’s big, heart-felt family reunion is just an excuse he cooked up to get out from under Sarah-Joan’s thumb so he can meet Sloan, the showgirl he’s been chatting with online for the last few weeks. I’ve seen it coming for weeks now—the more-vacant-than-usual look in his eye, the spiking data usage on his cell phone bill. I could have told Sara Joan this would happen if she gave him a cell phone. No one else but Josh and I are allowed unlimited access to wifi. Luckily, I set up all of Seth’s passwords, and he’s too stupid to know he should have changed them. Sarah Joan has been over indulgent with Seth, and now he’s drifting—hopefully out of sight for good.
At the station, I pull into the entrance marked “busses only” and pull up to the stop and open the door. Several passengers are waiting in the shade of the shelter. When they see me, they begin collecting their things and walk toward the bus like I’m there to pick them up.
“Thanks for the lift,” Seth says when he reaches the front of the aisle.
“The pleasure is all mine,” I say.
His cell phone pings in his pocket. He bounds down the steps reaching for the phone before his feet hit the pavement.
I slam the door behind him before any of the confused passengers can try to board and pull away.
Two miles from the Children of Christ turnoff, the traffic is already starting to back up. Along such a remote county road, with nothing but cornfields on every horizon, a traffic jam seems out of place. There are passenger cars, pick-up trucks, minivans and SUV’s, filled with the faithful. There are no honking horns or fists clenched around steering wheels. No one is cursing, or worrying about what the boss will say if they arrive late. They’ve all planned ahead and left early. This is a traffic jam for the Lord. Bumper-to-bumper, from here to the hereafter. That would make an excellent bumper sticker. I’ll have to remember to tell Josh. He can work up a new design and upload it to the online storefront. The t-shirts haven’t been selling as well lately, and it’s time to change things up.