Most of the unfortunate events in my life have begun with a phone call from my mother, and today was no exception.
My cell phone was giving out the special ring tone I’d come up with for her—Chopin’s “Funeral March.” I sighed, and left it in my pocket as I walked down the crowded sidewalk. It was a bright sunny day on Telegraph Avenue, and I was headed to the Caffe Med for a double-shot mocha. Oh and to meet up with Scott and Gia. I was currently late, but not by much.
It’s your mother, Cleone said, an intimate whisper in my ear.
“I know.” Still, I didn’t answer it.
She’s going to have your hide if you don’t answer...
“Aren’t you supposed to be on my side? I growled. He didn’t answer, and the music continued. Finally, it stopped, then restarted almost immediately.
I dug the phone out of my jeans pocket before Cleone could nag at me again. “Hi, Mom.”
“Sybil,” she breathed into the phone, stretching out the ess. “You must come home right away. Something horrible has happened.”
Toilet's probably backed up again, Cleone sniggered.
"Wise-ass," I hissed. But he was probably right. Sometimes he seemed to know my mother better than I did. For sure he knew her plumbing better.
"My toilet's all plugged up," my mother wailed.
Toldja, Cleone said, having deduced from my expression that he'd been right yet again. Some day I'd like to punch the smirk right off his face. It was just one of a million things he did that annoyed me. Like that insufferable habit of always talking without quotation marks. So pretentious.
"If you can't help me, send Cleone," my mother continued. "He's so good with tools."
Pretentious and handy around the house. If anything, he was looking even more smug now.
we'll have to stop at my place first, he said. i have to pick up my plunger.
Oh, God! There go the capitals now! What a pompous grandstander.
Opening: Calendula.....Continuation: Paul Penna
15 comments:
Unchosen Continuations:
"What -- another hangnail?" I sniffed. A pause: ever the drama queen, if something could go wrong, she was there at the sharp end of it. Maybe she'd blocked the garbage disposal again, or flooded the kitchen with laundry water. Mother was all about crises.
"You never take me seriously," she whined, a counterpoint tremor in her voice. I rolled my eyes at Cleone.
"What, mother? What is it this time?"
"I... I lost money by switching to Geico."
I felt sick as the world spun around me.
--Anonymous
Finally, Cleone said triumphantly.
“Shut up, idiot,” I hissed, putting my hand over the phone.
“Sybil?”
“Yes, mom, I’m here. What’s happened?”
“Sybil, they cancelled Knots Landing!”
Cleone huffed in exasperation.
“Mom, Knots Landing was cancelled years ago. Sometime in the eighties.”
“That’s what I mean, they cancelled it!”
“Mom, it’s fine. Really. Can I call you later? I’m meeting some friends.”
“Yes…” she said, her voice trailing off.
“Mom, was there something else wrong?”
“Yes…what was it…I just…OH, YES! I remember. You’re brother’s dead. Hung himself in the basement. The police are here. But, Sybil, will they ever bring Knots Landing back?”
Told you I was dead, Cleone said in a razzing tone.
--Unagirl
I figured this would be one of her usual crises: the satelitte went out, she was out of cigarettes, the cat puked on the floor.
"Oh? What happened?" I tried to sound interested. Cleone glared at me.
"It's Geoff. He was eaten by weredingoes."
--Khazar-khum
Besides the lack of quotation marks for Cleone, Sybil's quotation marks don't close after one of her statements.
Cleon being a known man's name, I suspected Cleone might be a female, and that the narrator was probably male, because of the intimate whisper. The truth isn't revealed until paragraph 6. This page of a baby name website seems to think Cleone is a female name:
http://www.babynamesworld.com/search.php?p=qsearch&s_gender=1&s_copt=2&i_search=cleon
“You must come home right away. Something horrible has happened.” sounds unnatural, but perhaps not to this character. I would say, "Can you come home? The dog fell into the garbage disposal," or "I need you to come home, my calluses need scraping."
Besides the lack of quotation marks for Cleone, Sybil's quotation marks don't close after one of her statements.
Cleon being a known man's name, I suspected Cleone might be a female, and that the narrator was probably male, because of the intimate whisper. The truth isn't revealed until paragraph 6. This page of a baby name website seems to think Cleone is a female name:
http://www.babynamesworld.com/search.php?p=qsearch&s_gender=1&s_copt=2&i_search=cleon
“You must come home right away. Something horrible has happened.” sounds unnatural, but perhaps not to this character. I would say, "Can you come home? The dog fell into the garbage disposal," or "I need you to come home, my calluses need scraping."
Paul's continuation is breathtakingly magnificent.
I liked the opening and the continuation had me laughing my calluses off!
I loved the continuation.
thanks, folks. and thanks to ee for his textual emendations. sometimes i wonder if this guy is as evil as he's cracked up to be.
The opening shows lots of possibilities. I would continue reading to see what dear-old-mum has to say.
Hi EE,
Congrats on hitting 400. I really wish I'd been here from the beginning.
nice opening and continuations.
I agree that Cleone is a female name. Even without seeing a baby name page, it reads female. Why not make this unquoted whisperer Cleon?
It is intentional or happenstance that both names we're given (Sybil and Cleon(e)) have connections to the ancient Mediterranean world?
And the continuation was a riot!
Hey, you said you wanted NaNo novel openings... heh. "unedited" hardly begins to describe it. But Cleone's utterances should be in italics, which I guess didn't come through. And thanks for catching the missing close-quote for Sybil. :-)
I didn't know Cleon was a man's name. Cleone is the name of a tiny town on the Mendocino County coast, and I just liked it. I'll consider clearing that up. thanks, all!
I'm 21,000 words into it now. You may expect a query to skewer in the coming year...
I immediately thought of Cleon Jones of the NY Mets, so I thought Cleone must be female.
What do I know? ;-)
Anyway, I like this. Chopin's Funeral March when her mom calls - brilliant!
And that continuation was great!
~Nancy
http://writerlystuff.blogspot.com
Loved the special ring tone. Unless we're about to meet Scott and Gia right away there's kind of a lot of wasted info there. I'd rather go straight to Cleone.
But Cleone's utterances should be in italics, which I guess didn't come through.
I could make that change, but it would kind of screw up the continuation.
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