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May 2011 Main Page Snapshot Excerpt Part 8
Could Indians Have Destroyed One of the 13 Colonies? Exchange Sequel
Comments Section Point Of Divergence is an amateur press magazine and also a forum for discussing AH and AH-related ideas. Here is my comment section. |
This
is an excerpt from the middle of one of my Work In Process novels.
I don't know how much of what is going on you'll understand.
It's not quite an alternate history, but does some of the
same things a different way. I include it to give you some of
the flavor of the workshop portion of Point of Divergence and because
it was part of the issue of Point of Divergence this zine is based on.
Wind Lady was already gearing up for Sugar Check weekend when they arrived early Thursday afternoon. Fields near town sprouted signs touting their prices for parking and electricity. In town, the stores looked cleaner and better stocked. Trucks and horse drawn or electric carts bustled past, distributing goods. Food vendors set up on a huge field outside town. The 'Dunnes' checked into the hotel, where their room cost five times as much as on their first visit. They dropped off their luggage and went back out. A dozen young black men were piling goods on electric trucks from a hardware store sporting a sign like the one in the restaurant window, "People of Color Welcome on Thursdays." John Calvin Lewis waved as the safari bus drove by, then strolled over when the pastor stopped. "So you do know these crackers." Pastor Julius said, "I hear you've met." "Yep." John Calvin leaned over to Greg. "Have you figured out who is pulling your strings yet?" "I have some idea." "Whatever your idea is, it's wrong." A dozen German truck drivers marched by, dressed in brown coveralls that looked like uniforms. The black men stopped loading and faced the Germans with expressions of bristling dislike, but none of them said anything. John Calvin stared after the Germans. "Nazis, all of them. Essence of cracker without the hiding of it most white folks do." Pastor Julius said, "You need to save your hating for your real enemies." The man who swapped suitcases with Terry Haigh strolled by. He ignored the German truck drivers. "I'm hungry,” Amelia said. “Let's sample the food vendors." John Calvin said, "Is that a whites-only invite?" "All God's children get hungry," the pastor said. "I might join you once we get those trucks loaded." They ended up at the same restaurant as on their first night in Wind Lady. JoAnne Waite greeted them. She gave John Calvin a big smile. "It's been too long." "I'm trying to be less hypocritical. If I tell people not to mix with white folks I can't be eating here every Thursday, can I?" "So why today?" Greg asked. "Big bunch of Nazi truckers in town. If I'm here they'll turn around and leave when they see me. I get to eat the best lemur steaks in town and they eat second best." "So you're chasing off my customers." "You don't want Nazis or cockroaches in here anyway." "I try to keep politics out." JoAnne brushed against Greg as she led them back to their table. Heather immediately grabbed his arm. He whispered, "Why do you keep doing that?" "I see the way you look at her." "And this matters to you why?" "Children, don't fight in front of John Calvin," the pastor said. “Ah, here they come.” Several German truckers came in, saw John Calvin, and made a noisy show of leaving. The pastor grinned. “That went well.” (snip) “Why are so many of you folks so fat and sloppy looking?” John Calvin asked. “Not just white folks. Black folks too.” “There are as many explanations as there are fad diets,” Heather said. “Nobody really knows. It could be life style. It could be germs that mess with metabolism.” “The fat helped during the hungry time,” Greg said. “And the hungry time helped with the fat problem. If you think we are bad now you should have seen us before the snapshot.” “No thanks,” John Calvin said. JoAnne Waite came back and delivered their food. She said, "I'm inviting everyone to a play I'm in tomorrow and Sunday afternoon. It's a musical called The Russian Front." "Sounds depressing," Heather said. "No. It's a comedy about Allied prisoners who basically take over a German prisoner of war camp during World War II and use it to spy on the Germans." "Hogan's Heroes," Greg said. "You're doing Hogan's Heroes as a musical!" "I've never heard of Hogan's Heroes," JoAnne said. "Television comedy from the 1960s," Greg said. "Are you sure you want to perform that with all the German truckers in town?" "Yes, actually I do," JoAnne said. "They won't enjoy it, but we need to poke holes in their superiority complex." "Nazis were a bunch of vicious morons," Greg said. "They got lucky a couple of times early in the war and decided they were invincible. They pretended to be super-efficient, but they were bumblers, and very close to the least efficient major power. Italy or Japan would probably take first place. Why would anyone that knew anything about them want to be like them?" They finished eating and the pastor and John Calvin went their separate ways. When they got back to the hotel, Amelia made a point of rushing into the bathroom first, locking Greg and a seething Heather out. They heard the shower running a couple of minutes later. "That girl is a little bitch. She could have left the door unlocked so I could pee." "I hate to remind you of this, but you did the same thing to us the first night." "Whatever. I feel like my clothes are going to walk away on their own." Heather sat on the bed and took her shoes off. "I'm going to get out of them and spend some time in a real bed, with real sheets and running water." She shed her outer clothes and slipped under the covers. "This is not an invitation to climb on top of me. Don't." "Didn't intend to." Greg kicked his shoes off and sprawled on the other side of the bed. He fell asleep within seconds as his body tried to make up for the irregular hours of the last couple of nights. He woke to a half-remembered dream of JoAnne Waite lying beside him, of a long, slow kiss and gradually building passion. It was dark outside. Amelia's IG provided the only light in the hotel room. She snuggled in the other bed, with the IG in her hand. As Greg watched, she dozed off, woke up enough to select an icon on the IG's screen and dozed off again. The other side of his bed was empty. He sat up. "Where's Heather?" "She went out. You slept three hours. You must have an iron bladder." "That would be a no." Greg rushed to the bathroom. When he got out, Amelia was sound asleep, with the IG dangling from her relaxing hands. He extracted it before it fell and sat it on the end-table. He glanced at his watch. Nine at night. The nap took the edge off his sleepiness. He paced the hotel room's hard wood floors. A constant flow of people and vehicles passed the window. He heard the faint sound of a badly played banjo from a nearby room. Greg thought about the dream. Too soon to be dreaming of someone else. And she's not really dead. I’ll just never see her again. That thought depressed him, and the quiet, dark hotel room brought an overwhelming loneliness, a need for human contact. He pushed his thoughts back to his current situation. The pastor's motives still puzzled him, and he worried that problem like a dog gnawing a bone. What if the scam was actually a trap? Maybe the DNA comes back wrong, and all three of us get sent to jail. Why? A high profile case for the sheriff. Lots of publicity. But there are easier ways to do that, and no signs of a coming election. "And there are too many smart people running around," Greg said. "Lyle's a genius. John Calvin Lewis is a genius. The pastor is a genius in his way." "And I'm a genius too," Amelia said. "Who are you talking to?" "Myself." "You could have a nice conversation inside your head instead of waking me up." "I suppose, but what's the fun in that?" "People don't think you're crazy for one," Amelia said. "And I don't throw stuff at you." "Okay, that's reason enough." Greg sat on the bed again and propped himself up with the pillows. "You see my point though. Too many smart people in a jerkwater town with nothing to attract smart people." "Sometimes that happens. I've been in dumb classes and I've been in smart classes. There's no pattern I can see. Why does it matter?" "I don't know if it does. By the way, genius, what are your plans for the lemur nest in your backpack?" "Oh. Thanks for reminding me. I'll play jigsaw puzzle with it." Amelia started to get the backpack out, then shrugged. "In the morning." Greg leaned back on his pillows, still fully dressed except for his shoes. He finally got back to sleep, dreamed about JoAnne Waite again, and woke up feeling guilty. He realized Heather wasn’t on the other side of the bed, and thought about turning his head to see what time it was. That seemed like entirely too much work, and he quickly went back to sleep. Heather came in at six in the morning. Greg heard the door close, and saw her cross to the bathroom in the semi-darkness. The shower ran briefly, then she slid into bed beside him. He smelled alcohol on her breath. She ran a hand over his chest. “I know you’re awake.” Greg sat up. “I am now.” “Just hold me. Nothing else.” “I’m not sure I want to.” “I don’t want a ‘where were you‘ argument. We’re not married. You’re not my boss.” “I never said I was.” “I’m cold.” She pressed her leg against his thigh. “You’re still dressed.” She laid her arm on his chest and pressed her breast against his arm. Greg felt the cold of her skin against his arm. He could also feel that she was naked. “And you aren’t dressed. I’m getting mixed signals here.” “Get used to it.” She put her head on his chest and closed her eyes. Within fifteen seconds her breathing found the slow regular pattern of sleep. *** Greg dozed off. When he woke, sun streamed through a gap in the drapes. Heather was still asleep, her head on his chest. Amelia was sitting at a desk with fragments of paper from the nest spread in front of her, taking pictures of the fragments. She glanced back when he stirred. “So cow boobs finally got you to sleep with her. I hope you used extra strength cootie protection. And ewww.” “We slept in the same bed. We didn’t do anything that requires cootie protection, extra strength or otherwise.” “I’ll try to believe you because the truth is too therapy-inducing.” Greg peered down at Heather. She showed no sign of waking up. She did, however, show signs of a black eye. “She came in early this morning and seems to have a shiner.” “Great. Now it’ll look like you beat your wife. We need to ditch the bitch before she screws things up beyond fixing.” “Not my call.” Greg pointed to the pieces of paper. “Let me guess. You’re trying a computer reconstruction.” “That’s a bingo.” “You don’t have a program to do that, and you can’t go to the Internet to get one.” “Ah, but I can write my own.” “That would be impressive.” “Not really. I have a dual-boot Windows/Linux system and I can do most of it by feeding it through Linux utilities. I’ll do some trivial programming.” “You don’t look like a computer geek.” “I’m not, but I had a crush on one. I learned a bunch of stuff to impress him, but it actually threatened his fragile ego and he spent all his time trying to get a cheerleader type to notice him. Epic fail on that.” Someone knocked on the door. Greg extracted himself from Heather, and pulled the sheet over her face to hide the black eye before answering. Lyle stood outside. "I know it’s early for city folks, but I came in for Sugar Check and figured I’d give Amelia something." Lyle handed her a box with something moving and scratching inside it. She peeked in through a hole in the top. "What is it?" "Dinosaur chick. I found the nest. I can’t get Fluffy to come in yet. Somebody shot her. I wish I could get close to her and see how bad it is." Greg said, "And why are you bringing us the chick?" "A present. We can't have her growing up around Fido or we’d have inbred chicks in a few years. They might even have five fingers." Amelia said, "Thanks. We'll take it." "I don't know about that," Greg said. "We don’t know how to take care of it, and the hotel--" "I'm pretty sure they don't have rules against dinosaurs." "They may have rules against pets." Amelia said, "It's settled. It's too cute to leave out in the cold cruel world." "Have fun. It mostly eats meat. Tear it into strips. It gets hungry every two hours." Lyle grinned a mischievous grin and hurried away. Amelia said, "Is that around the clock?" Lyle just smiled as he disappeared down the corridor. "Way to go," Greg said. "You realize that he handed you an albatross." "Albatross? More like a puppy. Come look at it. It's so cute." Greg looked into the box. The baby dinosaur was not much bigger than a newborn chick, with its eyes still closed, and only a scraggly sprinkling of down. "It's ugly as sin." "Yeah, but it's a cute ugly." "I hope you still think so when you get up at two in the morning to feed it." "I probably won't, but I'll do it." "I have experience with preteen promises about pets," Greg said. "You have kids? They should be more careful who they let reproduce.” “I had kid. Singular. A daughter.” The dinosaur chick raised its head and opened its mouth. It made a peeping sound, waited a second, then peeped again. Amelia said, "That's a cute little sound." The chick peeped again, then let loose a sound like a chainsaw revving. Amelia almost dropped the box. Heather sat upright, displaying a great deal of flesh. "What are you doing? What is that?" Amelia said, "I think we've been had." "I don't mind saying I told you so," Greg said. "It actually feels good, or it would if you got it to shut up." The dinosaur chick continued the chainsaw noise. Somebody in the next room yelled, "Shut that thing off." "What are you going to do?" Greg asked. "I don't know. Make it stop!" "You make it stop. It’s yours." Amelia reached in to pet the animal but jerked her hand back as its mouth snapped shut near her fingers. "I thought he liked me." "Who, the dinosaur?" "No. Lyle. He knew what this thing would do." "This is called teaching life lessons," Greg said. "He's big on that." Heather ran to the bathroom. As she slammed the door she said, “Get that thing quiet!” “How do we shut it up?” Amelia asked. “No. How do you get it to shut up?” The dinosaur started its chainsaw imitation again. Someone pounded on the wall. “Turn it off!” “We’ll get kicked out of the hotel,” Amelia said. “What should I do?” “Handle it.” Greg laughed, then relented. “It’s hungry. Get it something to eat.” They walked to a grocery store, with the dinosaur continuing the chainsaw noise. Someone said, "2011" like it was a swear word. Amelia bought a package of roast beef and a can of puppychow. "I hope this isn't part of his joke," Amelia said. "Maybe it projectile vomits if you feed it meat." "I don't think he would actually hurt an animal," Greg said. Nobody came over to look at the animal in the box. "I wonder why they aren't curious," Amelia said. "They've decided they don't like our kind and this is another weird thing we do." "Are we really that nasty?" "I don't know. Hard to see yourself from other peoples' eyes. If they get their opinions of us from TV I could see them not liking us." The meat strips satiated the dinosaur chick and Amelia petted it until it fell asleep, stirring slightly as Amelia stroked its head. As they strolled back to the hotel a half a dozen guys in their early twenties came out of a bar. One of them bumped Greg with his shoulder. Greg walked on without reacting. The kid said something about 2011, but subsided when the sheriff came around the corner. Sheriff Haigh strode over and said, “I hear you were playing with a chainsaw in your hotel room.” Greg pointed to the box. “Lyle conned her into taking a dinosaur chick. He must have run a chainsaw near it. You know how they pick up sounds.” The sheriff laughed. “That old boy saw you coming.” “Yep.” “Okay. Keep the thing fed. Don’t waste my time on chainsaws in a hotel room.”
Posted on March 26, 2010.
More Stuff For POD Members Only What you see here is a truncated on-line version of a larger zine that I contribute to POD, the alternate history APA. POD members get to look forward to more fun stuff.
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