evantan
12-02-2008, 06:55 PM
Can anyone critique this short story I wrote? Constructive criticisms are much appreciated. It's not the whole of the story since there's a limit on characters, but if anyone would want to read it through, I'd be happy to post the rest.
4 A.M. by Evan Tan
For the fifth time, he woke up naked, standing on the front porch outside his house that early morning.
I
The first time it happened, he thought it too absurd, too comical to be true. That Monday 4 A.M., he saw himself as bare as the day he was born outside on his front porch, facing Mrs. Zaide’s house across the street.
He found it quite silly – a word he rarely associated with.
And so, he naturally assumed he must’ve been dreaming. He waited for the dream to come out from its hiding place and reveal itself for what it truly was.
But it became evident, as the minutes passed, that this dream character was not going to show itself anytime soon. The cold had begun to clamp itself on his extremities – the jaws of reality had sunk in. With the situation now blatantly clear, he scampered back inside the house without another thought, horrified that his neighbors might see him.
Inside, he sat bewildered behind the front door and tried to make sense of the incident.
He doubted that it was sleepwalking. He was (somewhat – no, definitely!) sure that he wasn’t the type to sleepwalk. (He even called his mother the next day to confirm this, asking if there were any episodes of somnambulism during his childhood. “Never,” was her reply.)
He considered the likelihood that someone had come inside the house and pulled a prank on him. Though admittedly quite a difficult stunt to pull off (had they drugged him? hypnotized him?), it was still possible, and so he tried to approach it logically. If ever, who, and why? He flipped through the album of faces in his memory. He couldn’t identify anyone. None of his friends, he believed, would have done such a thing. It was similarly ludicrous to assume that his colleagues would have even thought of doing so. Nobody had a motive; nobody is that childish.
Was it a burglar, who had pulled a practical joke before leaving? You could never really tell nowadays. Papers had recently reported a number of psychotic criminals roaming around the city. Was he a victim then? He went around the house and checked his belongings: everything was there. No sign of breaking and entering.
Then stories from the provinces, about supernatural creatures playing tricks on people, flickered in his mind. As implausible as it sounded, he postponed disbelief. By then, he was ready to believe anything. Most especially after seeing the spectacle that greeted him when he opened his bedroom door: his pajamas were neatly folded on the bedside; the king-sized bed was also made. Everything was arranged and put in order.
Recounting the last few moments before he slept, he was definite that he had been wearing those pajamas, and he was sure that he wasn’t that stiff a sleeper.
He sat down on the bed and worried himself from sleep thinking about the rationales, causes, the such and the like, until morning finally came.
II
The first time, had it been also the last, would’ve been most likely forgotten, or maybe faintly remembered in senility, that period when people never exactly trusted their memories anymore.
Only, it happened again, on Tuesday early morning.
As he drove towards Makati where he worked as operations manager of local contact center firm C––––, he replayed the scene over in his head: outside the house, 4 A.M., naked facing his neighbor’s house. He rushed inside to find, just like the first time, his striped blue pajamas he wore after showering folded on the bed, the baconed briefs carefully placed atop the clothes. The bed, like yesterday, was unexplainably made (the sheets tucked in, the pillows neatly stacked.)
He couldn’t keep going like this, he said to himself, so the moment he arrived in the office, he flipped through the yellow pages his secretary kept at the magazine shelf, and began searching the ads under “Supernatural Creature Eliminators/Exterminators” – page 845, Commercial/Industrial Section.
While he could’ve first chosen to hire a private investigator to address his other, more logical theories, the truth was he was too afraid to be found standing naked outside the house by a stranger who could then blackmail him for it. No – he couldn’t risk that. His position made him vulnerable and his reputation was at stake. He imagined the consequential scenario in his mind: the man would take advantage of him and make demands, he would give in, and he is trapped in a vicious cycle. If he doesn’t give in, however, the man would reveal his “little” secret.
The ruin and shame! He could imagine the water cooler gossips lashing out their cattiest remarks the moment they find out: An exhibitionist in the company – and a high-ranking one at that. And was it even worth looking at? Well, why don’t we wait outside his house at exactly 4 A.M.? The company officials would then fire him soon afterwards, wanting to disassociate the call center’s untarnished name from such perversion.
And so he opted then to test the outrageous theory first. No harm in doing this – just to be sure, he convinced himself. So he scanned the ads under the category until he came across one that caught his interest: I Exorcise At Half the Price. 843-XXXX.
He immediately grabbed the phone and pressed the digits. An answering machine responded on the other line, politely advising him to leave a message after the beep. He resolved to simply give his name and number, skipping the whole story altogether. After all, real exterminators didn’t need to know why their services are needed – they simply exterminated, he reasoned.
Just before he put down, however, somebody on the other line picked up.
“Yes, how may I help you?”
Violent screams at the background of the other line blared on his ears. “Sorry, but what is that?”
“Currently exorcising, but it can wait. What can I do mister?”
The voice from the other line – a raspy, flat woman’s voice – tried very hard to disguise the impatience, but he sensed it immediately. Just the way he liked it of course, to be honest. This woman obviously meant business. If she was too chipper or too interested in his problem he would’ve hung up at once: he couldn’t deal with those kinds of people. He wanted everything to be formal, rigid and direct-to-the-point.
“I think I have a presence in my house.”
He became anxious that the woman would ask what kind of trouble the presence exactly caused, but she didn’t seem to care much about the details. “Where do you live?”
He recited his address, raising his voice a bit louder – the pandemonium on the other line had become beyond control. Afterwards he added hopefully, “Can you come later this afternoon?”
A pause. Pressing the earpiece closer, he listened as the woman put down the receiver and shouted in a language he didn’t understand – an incantation of some sort. The uproar had turned for the worse: the shrieks were now murderous.
The woman was back. “No. I have a full schedule for the whole day. Are you available tomorrow?”
The thought of going through the episode again that night horrified him, but he was left with no choice. “Yes.”
“2 P.M.” She immediately hung up.
III
Fortunately, for the third time, his exhibitionism has been without spectators.
That Tuesday night, following the call with the exterminator, a little stroke of genius came to him in his desperation. After office, he headed straight to the hardware store in a nearby mall and bought twenty-five new padlocks.
One by one, he meticulously installed them at every opening in the house, and then placed all of the keys on top of the wooden mahogany cabinet in the guest room. After doing so, he greased the cabinet doors, then the stool he stood on to reach the top of the cabinet.
The logic was flawless. He deduced that if someone is indeed pulling a prank on him, the locks would prevent him/her from repeating the deed again; meanwhile, if in the (unlikely) chance that he was sleepwalking, he would slip and wake up (probably with a broken bone or a fractured head, but it was worth the risk) should he attempt to reach for it because of the grease.
He put on his generic striped pajamas and went to bed, lulled to sleep by his scheme, only to wake up at exactly 4 A.M., early Wednesday, on the very same situation as the past two days.
Only this morning he found himself locked out.
Composing himself, he walked to the backyard. Using a fairly large rock he collected from the grotto, he smashed open one of the backyard windows, pulled it up, and squeezed in through the small opening. Aware of the commotion he had caused, he rushed straight to the living room and peered outside through a window to see if anyone had been roused by the ruckus. Sure enough, the lights from Mrs. Zaide’s house had all been turned on. He caught a glimpse of his geriatric widow neighbor from her bedroom window, warily looking outside. She disappeared after a few minutes.
He sighed in relief.
Moments later, he heard police sirens fast approaching.
He ran upstairs to his room, and hid under the covers.
4 A.M. by Evan Tan
For the fifth time, he woke up naked, standing on the front porch outside his house that early morning.
I
The first time it happened, he thought it too absurd, too comical to be true. That Monday 4 A.M., he saw himself as bare as the day he was born outside on his front porch, facing Mrs. Zaide’s house across the street.
He found it quite silly – a word he rarely associated with.
And so, he naturally assumed he must’ve been dreaming. He waited for the dream to come out from its hiding place and reveal itself for what it truly was.
But it became evident, as the minutes passed, that this dream character was not going to show itself anytime soon. The cold had begun to clamp itself on his extremities – the jaws of reality had sunk in. With the situation now blatantly clear, he scampered back inside the house without another thought, horrified that his neighbors might see him.
Inside, he sat bewildered behind the front door and tried to make sense of the incident.
He doubted that it was sleepwalking. He was (somewhat – no, definitely!) sure that he wasn’t the type to sleepwalk. (He even called his mother the next day to confirm this, asking if there were any episodes of somnambulism during his childhood. “Never,” was her reply.)
He considered the likelihood that someone had come inside the house and pulled a prank on him. Though admittedly quite a difficult stunt to pull off (had they drugged him? hypnotized him?), it was still possible, and so he tried to approach it logically. If ever, who, and why? He flipped through the album of faces in his memory. He couldn’t identify anyone. None of his friends, he believed, would have done such a thing. It was similarly ludicrous to assume that his colleagues would have even thought of doing so. Nobody had a motive; nobody is that childish.
Was it a burglar, who had pulled a practical joke before leaving? You could never really tell nowadays. Papers had recently reported a number of psychotic criminals roaming around the city. Was he a victim then? He went around the house and checked his belongings: everything was there. No sign of breaking and entering.
Then stories from the provinces, about supernatural creatures playing tricks on people, flickered in his mind. As implausible as it sounded, he postponed disbelief. By then, he was ready to believe anything. Most especially after seeing the spectacle that greeted him when he opened his bedroom door: his pajamas were neatly folded on the bedside; the king-sized bed was also made. Everything was arranged and put in order.
Recounting the last few moments before he slept, he was definite that he had been wearing those pajamas, and he was sure that he wasn’t that stiff a sleeper.
He sat down on the bed and worried himself from sleep thinking about the rationales, causes, the such and the like, until morning finally came.
II
The first time, had it been also the last, would’ve been most likely forgotten, or maybe faintly remembered in senility, that period when people never exactly trusted their memories anymore.
Only, it happened again, on Tuesday early morning.
As he drove towards Makati where he worked as operations manager of local contact center firm C––––, he replayed the scene over in his head: outside the house, 4 A.M., naked facing his neighbor’s house. He rushed inside to find, just like the first time, his striped blue pajamas he wore after showering folded on the bed, the baconed briefs carefully placed atop the clothes. The bed, like yesterday, was unexplainably made (the sheets tucked in, the pillows neatly stacked.)
He couldn’t keep going like this, he said to himself, so the moment he arrived in the office, he flipped through the yellow pages his secretary kept at the magazine shelf, and began searching the ads under “Supernatural Creature Eliminators/Exterminators” – page 845, Commercial/Industrial Section.
While he could’ve first chosen to hire a private investigator to address his other, more logical theories, the truth was he was too afraid to be found standing naked outside the house by a stranger who could then blackmail him for it. No – he couldn’t risk that. His position made him vulnerable and his reputation was at stake. He imagined the consequential scenario in his mind: the man would take advantage of him and make demands, he would give in, and he is trapped in a vicious cycle. If he doesn’t give in, however, the man would reveal his “little” secret.
The ruin and shame! He could imagine the water cooler gossips lashing out their cattiest remarks the moment they find out: An exhibitionist in the company – and a high-ranking one at that. And was it even worth looking at? Well, why don’t we wait outside his house at exactly 4 A.M.? The company officials would then fire him soon afterwards, wanting to disassociate the call center’s untarnished name from such perversion.
And so he opted then to test the outrageous theory first. No harm in doing this – just to be sure, he convinced himself. So he scanned the ads under the category until he came across one that caught his interest: I Exorcise At Half the Price. 843-XXXX.
He immediately grabbed the phone and pressed the digits. An answering machine responded on the other line, politely advising him to leave a message after the beep. He resolved to simply give his name and number, skipping the whole story altogether. After all, real exterminators didn’t need to know why their services are needed – they simply exterminated, he reasoned.
Just before he put down, however, somebody on the other line picked up.
“Yes, how may I help you?”
Violent screams at the background of the other line blared on his ears. “Sorry, but what is that?”
“Currently exorcising, but it can wait. What can I do mister?”
The voice from the other line – a raspy, flat woman’s voice – tried very hard to disguise the impatience, but he sensed it immediately. Just the way he liked it of course, to be honest. This woman obviously meant business. If she was too chipper or too interested in his problem he would’ve hung up at once: he couldn’t deal with those kinds of people. He wanted everything to be formal, rigid and direct-to-the-point.
“I think I have a presence in my house.”
He became anxious that the woman would ask what kind of trouble the presence exactly caused, but she didn’t seem to care much about the details. “Where do you live?”
He recited his address, raising his voice a bit louder – the pandemonium on the other line had become beyond control. Afterwards he added hopefully, “Can you come later this afternoon?”
A pause. Pressing the earpiece closer, he listened as the woman put down the receiver and shouted in a language he didn’t understand – an incantation of some sort. The uproar had turned for the worse: the shrieks were now murderous.
The woman was back. “No. I have a full schedule for the whole day. Are you available tomorrow?”
The thought of going through the episode again that night horrified him, but he was left with no choice. “Yes.”
“2 P.M.” She immediately hung up.
III
Fortunately, for the third time, his exhibitionism has been without spectators.
That Tuesday night, following the call with the exterminator, a little stroke of genius came to him in his desperation. After office, he headed straight to the hardware store in a nearby mall and bought twenty-five new padlocks.
One by one, he meticulously installed them at every opening in the house, and then placed all of the keys on top of the wooden mahogany cabinet in the guest room. After doing so, he greased the cabinet doors, then the stool he stood on to reach the top of the cabinet.
The logic was flawless. He deduced that if someone is indeed pulling a prank on him, the locks would prevent him/her from repeating the deed again; meanwhile, if in the (unlikely) chance that he was sleepwalking, he would slip and wake up (probably with a broken bone or a fractured head, but it was worth the risk) should he attempt to reach for it because of the grease.
He put on his generic striped pajamas and went to bed, lulled to sleep by his scheme, only to wake up at exactly 4 A.M., early Wednesday, on the very same situation as the past two days.
Only this morning he found himself locked out.
Composing himself, he walked to the backyard. Using a fairly large rock he collected from the grotto, he smashed open one of the backyard windows, pulled it up, and squeezed in through the small opening. Aware of the commotion he had caused, he rushed straight to the living room and peered outside through a window to see if anyone had been roused by the ruckus. Sure enough, the lights from Mrs. Zaide’s house had all been turned on. He caught a glimpse of his geriatric widow neighbor from her bedroom window, warily looking outside. She disappeared after a few minutes.
He sighed in relief.
Moments later, he heard police sirens fast approaching.
He ran upstairs to his room, and hid under the covers.