The Writer's Life: The Writer's Life 1/17

Thursday, January 17, 2019

The Writer's Life 1/17 - Theorist

No luck selling books in a session abbreviated by the cold for a second straight day. With the news seeming blah, blah, blah, here's an excerpt from a story in The Billionths of a Lifetime collection. The title is Miller's Time. The clip is approximately a few minutes read:

He turned left from the elevator and immediately spotted a note taped to the door of his apartment just below the large UFT decal. He scanned the message, crumpled and threw it to the floor.
“I will not be bought,” he muttered indignantly.
His bushy beard and what remained of the hair on his head were largely gray. He was of average height, about 50 pounds overweight. He wore wire-rimmed glasses.
“Mr. Miller! Mr. Miller!” someone called.
Miller recognized the voice and sneered as he let go of the doorknob and turned to the middle age man in a suit. “I’ve got nothing to say to you, Costas.”
“Have you seen our latest offer?”
“I’m not joining the plot to rid Manhattan of the middle class, to make it a playground of the rich.”
“We’ll give you a studio right here in the building.”
“The maintenance fee would be more than my current rent. What kind of deal is that?”
“But you’d own the apartment and you’d be able to sell whenever you want. You have a nice pension and great benefits. You’d have no trouble keeping up.”
Miller eyed him with suspicion, seething. “How’d you find out about my finances?” No doubt the banks were in cahoots with real estate agents and building owners.
“Please, sir. You’re alone. You don’t need five rooms.”
“What if my wife comes back? Take a hike. I’d never trust someone like you.”
He entered the apartment and set one of the three locks. The interior was in the middle stages of disarray. Ashtrays filled to the brim were everywhere. His wife had always seen to the upkeep. He hadn’t the time or patience for it. It’d been a year since she walked out and moved to Florida. He was surprised she was able to live outside of Manhattan. Both had been born and always lived in the borough. They’d spent their entire married life, raised their children in this rent-controlled flat. He’d expected they would die here. He felt betrayed.
Without removing his coat, he lit a cigarette and sat at his cluttered desk, on which there were several books, a few open. He scanned a paragraph in one, closed it and returned it to its proper place on the top shelf of the case, which held books on the Kennedy assassination. The second was devoted to 9/11, the third to the McCarthy era. All were alphabetized.