TheBanyanTree: Post Stories

[David]

On 12/25/2013 11:33 PM, Jim Miller wrote:
> It is now after 12 am EST USA, Thursday December 26.
>   
> Start posting your stories of 500 words or less.
>   
> Jim

I started out with 500 words exactly, but after closer scrutiny a few of 
the words were discarded. So here is my 479 word post called Monday.


I received a text message. The phone in my breast pocket vibrated. It 
would be her. I left her alone this morning. Hopefully the text would 
give me a clue as to her name. Some of last night was a blur, but her 
green eyes stuck in my memory. And the way she said yes, following me to 
my third story walk up, taking each flight with the youthful vigor of a 
teenager.

"I hate Mondays." That was all the text read. No name, only her number. 
Well, her name was going to be Monday girl from henceforth. I wasn't too 
embarrassed to ask her. My life wasn't a TV sitcom. Of course I would 
ask Monday what her name was, or maybe I would just keep calling her 
Monday. Wouldn't that be a hoot. Maybe we would fall in love, get 
married, have children, grow old and retire, the entire time I would 
call her my Monday girl.

Fall hangs heavy over the city. Like a decaying drape, it diffuses the 
light and leaves a grey pallor. I sit on a concrete bench at the edge of 
a multi-million dollar rock garden the city proudly proclaims - the 
ultimate urban park. I nurse my Grande coffee and watch the office 
drones enter and leave the Starbucks across the street. With ordered 
predictability, each of

us settles into a mindless rut.

I was one of them now, sucking up the trickle down of corporate America. 
My Starbucks had the familiar burnt coffee taste that we all had become 
accustomed to. Somehow I had imagined things differently, picket fences, 
green spaces, unplugged, uncensored, maybe a little pot. Now green eyed 
Monday girl was part of the imagining. At least for today, to get me 
through, until I walked the three flights to my lonely apartment filled 
with enough mass consumer bourgeoisie materialism to make Tyler Durden 
vomit his last remains of social consciousness.

"But, I have the day off..." Another text from Monday. I stared blankly 
at the phone in my hand as I raised more corporate swill to my lips. I 
started a reply.

"Then how about if I call in sick today. Come back and get lost in your 
green eyes. Are you up for an excursion Monday? I've decided to call you 
Monday. I will never hate Mondays again, because you will always be my 
Monday girl.

"Let's do it Monday! Let's go find our little taste of the American 
dream. It's out there somewhere waiting for us, far from this concrete 
jungle with its pretentious coffee shops and hipster foodies. It's out 
where there is blotter acid, dirt roads, and cow shit. Let's start today 
to be our own heroes!"

I deleted the proposition, stuffed the phone back into my pocket just as 
it buzzed once again. It was Monday.

"So you want me to stay??"


Dave Seaman