Quicklinks:
|
Great Writing - Home > Short S. > Another Week -Tuesday
| READING ROOM | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
| COMMUNITY | |||
|---|---|---|---|
|
| ABOUT GREAT WRITING | ||
|---|---|---|
|
| WORK AWAITING REVIEW |
|---|
|
| GW IS... |
|---|
|
Great Writing creative writing community is designed to prompt ideas
and provide inspiration and motivation within aspiring and amateur
authors. Whatever your topic; from love poetry to Doctor Who or Harry
Potter fan fiction, Great Writing's online writing group is where you
can make new friends and improve your creative writing. |
| WHO'S ONLINE |
|---|
| We have 2050 guests online and 4 members online |
Shorts
| print friendly version | |
| Another Week -Tuesday | |
| By Sir_Nigel | ||||||||||
| 25 September 2006 | ||||||||||
|
Part 2 of this 'Another Week' thing. TuesdayIts 10.30 on a slow Tuesday, I've zipped through all my urgent work so I'll spend the rest of the day giving my usual pantomime of busy labour. I stack some files and papers around my desk to give the impression of mountains of work to be done and stare intently at my PC wearing an expression of thoughtful and studious efficiency. For added effect I might occasionally huff and puff in stressed exasperation at my 'demanding workload.' I check my watch, I have a meeting at 1.30, just routine stuff, then I can abandon even this charade and switch off altogether. 1.30. The meeting is full of all the usual gloomy faces. Curtains are drawn and lights dimmed for the overhead projector. As the chairman begins his droning presentation and the room becomes still and oppressive, cocooned from the outside world. Almost immediately my mind drifts off and I begin to wonder what would happen if there was suddenly some great cataclysm in the world outside and we in this room were somehow the only survivors? How would the human race survive? How would this sorry lot cope? And more importantly, who would we pair off with? The women are mostly time-serving old boilers or cardigan-clad plain janes. I spot one decent-looking girl though who's made an effort with her hair up and a smart suit. As we emerged blinking into the sunlight of the shattered new world, shocked and bewildered and afraid, I'd definitely target that pretty one to breed with. Here, help me with this I'd say, asking her to lift some fallen obstruction blocking our exit. Then our eyes would meet. I'd have to work quickly then, stressing it’s our duty to continue the species. Well, it could work. The presentation has finished now and we move on to the other agenda items. It’s one of those interminably dull meetings where arguments go round in circles but no-one dares make a decision. Try as I might I can't concentrate on the dreary discussions for more than a few seconds. I begin dismantling my pen to see how it works. Of course if she spurns me and decides she's not really ready to start repopulating the planet yet I'll become a hermit and go and live in a cave in the hills, sod the human race. There'll I'll survive by being inventive and self-sufficient, re-cycling the remains of the vanished civilisation, emerging from my lair to ensnare wild animals or to scare off approaching strangers with my wild and frightening appearance, and a big stick. 'Bleugherblrblubleugh!' I'll yell, leaping up and down, my wild hair and beard a-flying. Yes I think I'll be ever so slightly mad too. 'Bleugherblrblubleugh! Bleugherblrblubleugh!' "And what's your view on this, Robert.?" someone is suddenly asking me. "Erm, well" I take a deep breath, giving it some deep and thoughtful consideration. I cough. I stroke my chin. "Hmmm." I have no idea what they're talking about. Don't they know my mind is on higher things? "I'll have to look into that, I don’t have the data to hand. I'll give you a call." Has that worked? I surreptitiously steal a glance at the other faces. No-one is sniggering, no-one is pitying me. I've got away with it, hah. Obviously I'm a deep thinker, not prone to snap judgements. There is one other potential mate who might just do. She looks a bit of a tough cookie - cropped hair, wiry but pretty - the strong, athletic type. I doubt she'll be content just to sit in a cave, tending the offspring, scraping meat from animal bones and crushing herbs. She'll want to come hunting with me - chucking spears at all the wolves and bears that will no doubt return to our forests once their number one predator - man is out of the way. That's fine with me, it'll be hard work to survive and in fact, if things pan out, she could even be wife no.2. Why not? In the new world order there's no reason why I can't have two, I won't need to become a Mormon or anything. After all, the women outnumber the men two to one in here and frankly, as I look round the table, the competition isn't up to much - a lot of drab, beardy blokes in cheap suits plus a few florid, overweight, middle-aged types whose heart conditions will surely not survive the stress of apocalypse, there’s also a nerdy bloke who probably still lives with his mother, a fat guy with BO and a very dodgy syrup and that one's an old closet queen, everyone knows. Yes, so I'll have a nice little stay-at-home one and one to help with the heavy stuff. Perfect. We break for tea. However, just as I'm helping myself to some chocolate chip shortbread, I notice with dismay that potential mate no.2 has a bad limp. Not just some glamorous sporting injury either, but a proper limp that qualifies for an NHS stick - probably born with it. Shame that, I was banking on her athleticism and superior hand/eye co-ordination Although on second thoughts I could still take her hunting with me and if one day a wild beast suddenly turns on us....... well.....lets just leave it at that. It'd be tough in a culture of survival of the fittest. And grim. When we re-start I try listening for a while, nodding intelligently, making a few notes, drifting off again into doodles of wattle and daub shelters. I wonder how all the others will manage, all these cushioned suburban types, all the lost and bewildered fat sods wandering about wondering if any takeaways survived. They'll probably perish in the jaws of wild beasts most of 'em. In time I may descend from my cave with my long staff and become their leader - organise them into efficient farmers and hunters and warriors or maybe just shout LOOK BEHIND YOU, YOU DOZY FAT B*STARD! as the need arises. I'll be wiry, fit and alert, the highest in the food chain, ruthless but spiritual - at one with nature. Dealing with elemental matters: meat, fire, woman, procreation, death, maybe even do a little cave painting of an evening - I'll leave some odd two-headed spotty purple creatures for future scientists to puzzle over. Man in his natural element, not stuck behind a f*cking desk all day. People are packing up, tapping sheaves of paper like newsreaders, putting pens back in top pockets, clicking open briefcases. "Give me a ring by Friday would you Robert?" says the Chairman. "Sure, no problem, Graham" I say, already trying to think of a way to subtly weed out of someone what that was all about.
Only registered users can rate and write comments. Powered by AkoComment 2.0! |
||||||||||
 Previous item
|
Next item
|
|---|