Post by Seth Kerin on Apr 18, 2007 20:46:15 GMT -5
The Quiet Man
A Cautionary Tale
by
Seth Kerin
A Cautionary Tale
by
Seth Kerin
Steven Franks was always quiet. He was an average guy, working a middle class job at a phone service center. He didn’t answer phones – was too quiet for that job. Instead, he worked spreadsheets, input data, and kept the systems up to date so that the men and women he worked with could focus on their phone duties. It was simple, and largely unsatisfying work, but it paid the bills. What more was there, really?
As he pulled into the parking lot, he considered the folks he worked with. They were all older than him by at least ten years – he was only three years removed from college – and he found their lives to be dull and simple, though he would never say it out loud. Try as he might though, he could not find anything interesting in American Idol, Dancing with the Stars, or any of the other latest trends. He didn’t even know what a ‘Sanjaya’ was.
Poetry was his life. At breaks and lunch, while the others were chittering on and on about who was the next to be voted off the island, he scribbled poems, sonnets, even the occasional limerick. He scribbled them down, hid them when someone walked by, and tucked them in his desk when the breaktime bell rang again. They were his little hidden treasures – treasures he was willing to share, if anyone ever asked or really showed any interest beyond the suspicious glances.
He pulled his car into a spot, the old Ford Escort creaking in protest as he yanked the emergency brake, and placed his hand on the white box that sat on the passenger seat. Today would be different, he was convinced. Today, he would make some noise. Today, people would show interest. Today, for once, if even for a brief moment, people would notice him.
He picked up the box, comforted by the weight of it, and opened his door. He strode across the parking lot with a spring in his step that he had never felt before, a thrill at the prospect of what was to come. His trench coat blew in the stiff morning breeze, but even the bite of early spring’s chill could not slow him. He had to steady the box though – the wind nearly knocked it out of his hand. He was more careful crossing the second half of the parking lot though, imagining as he did the shocked looks on people’s faces when he opened the box.
The though brought a mischievous grin to his face.
He reached the side door of the building and flipped his badge past the sensor – a precaution that had been installed when one of his coworker’s boyfriend had gone ape-nuts and started stalking her everywhere she went. The sensors were a joke though, and everyone there knew it. The magnetic seal on the door could be broken by anyone who really wanted to get in, and there was always the possibility of a coworker going postal. It was always in the news – violence seemed inescapable.
Steven, his heart pounding, entered the building and walked up the stairs to the office, doing his best to keep a ‘nothing is different than usual’ expression on his face. He wanted no one to suspect until the last possible moment.
He entered the office, closing the door softly behind him. Cheryl, who sat next to the door, looked up at him, her wrinkled face showing her confusion clearly. Steven was late, and although he was never late, this was planned. He wanted to make sure everyone else had arrived so he could surprise them all at once. This is going to be great, he thought, barely containing his glee.
Derrick, Mike, Delia, Sandra, Rob, MaryBeth and the supervisor, Amanda, all poked their heads around the edges of their cubicles, as they typically did when someone walked in the door. They watched him with unblinking eyes as he walked slowly toward the table in the center of the room, pleasantly surprised to find it was empty. He set the box down carefully, and looked from one face to the next, expecting the usual ‘Hi Steven’ or at the very least the usual existence-acknowledging-head-nod he got from Mike. If there had been crickets in the room, he would have heard them loudly over the unusual silence.
Steven cracked a smile. At least he had their attention.
“Hello everyone,” he said, proud that in his moment of triumph his voice didn’t crack like it usually did when his nerves overrode his intent. “I’ve got a little surprise for you all.”
“I knew it,” Delia breathed, her eyes wide like a deer in the headlights.
Steven reached toward the box he had placed on the table, preparing to pull the lid off, “It’s right -”
His words were cut off in a blast of breath as Derrick spun him around and punched him hard in the gut in one smooth, almost practiced motion. Steven slumped to the his knees, gasping for air, but he had no chance to reach for the box as Rob – all two hundred fifty pounds of him – pushed Steven to the floor and sat his full weight on the younger man’s back.
“Slimy little bastard,” he heard Rob say. “We knew you were up to something.”
“We read your poems,” he heard MaryBeth say, her voice sounding disappointed, as if she were talking to a puppy who had peed on the floor. “Poems about death and dying.”
“And your mother,” Mike added. “Normal folks don’t write poems about their mothers.”
Someone shushed Mike, as they often did, and he obediently stopped talking.
“We tried to talk to you, Steven,” Amanda said. “We were all really afraid this day would come, though we honestly hoped it wouldn’t.”
Steven tried to speak, clawing at the floor, but his voice was nothing more than a muffled wheeze.
“Cheryl, call 911 and tell them the situation, Rob, stay where you are,” Amanda said.
Rob grunted, shifting his weight on Steven’s back.
“Derrick, can you open the box without getting fingerprints on it?”
“Yep.”
“Well, what is it?” Sandra asked, looking ready to faint.
“Is it an uzi, or a bomb?” Mike asked, morbidly curious.
“What the . . .”
“What is it?” Amanda asked, using her supervisor voice.
“Cupcakes.”
The group all gathered around the box and saw a two dozen cupcakes, neatly frosted to look like smiley faces staring up at them.
“Oh crap,” Mike said.
“Rob, get off him,” Amanda ordered, her voice trembling.
Rob grunted as he hauled his girth off Steven. “It’s too late,” he said, first feeling for a pulse and then shaking Steven, but to no avail. “Oh d**n, it’s too late.”
Amanda looked back at the box of smiley face cupcakes on the table, and she shook her head, tears rolling down her cheeks. The box was in the middle of the food table – the table where they always put the snacks that they brought in to share, or the treats they had baked. They were always eating there in the phone center, and Steven had brought them cupcakes.
She could already hear the distant sirens as the police rushed to their rescue.
“But . . . but the poems . . .” MaryBeth stuttered.
“They were just poems,” Amanda said, picking up one of the cupakes, the frosting eyes staring at her accusingly. “He was just quiet.”
“And these are just cupcakes.”
Thoughts: I wrote this in a very short time, and largely because the media has focused so much attention on details of the Virginia Tech killer that, quite frankly, describe me. I suppose, a rarity for my work, it's as much a statement as a short story. Still, and regardless of current events, I think it can stand on its own pretty well. I'd love to hear comments, thoughts, or whatever.
-Edit sorry about the weird formatting...doesn't copy from Word as nice as I'd hoped.
-SK
