“Man, are you serious? An Apple Juice Story?” Jeff shook his head, then took another bite of pork fried rice.
Across from him, Marlon was busy on his laptop. “What else should I call it?”
Jeff furrowed his brow. It was the ninth of November, and Marlon had been on this book-kick since the beginning of the month. Jeff hadn’t expected Marlon to actually write anything more than reality TV reviews; Marlon didn’t do much except watch those crap shows, well, there was Hannah. Then Jeff slapped his forehead. “This’s that writing thing she’s always talking about isn’t it?”
Marlon smiled, brushing jet-black hair from his eyes. “Yup.”
“Shit man, what’re you doing?”
“Gonna make a hundred bucks, if you’d just shut up.”
“So, what’s it about?” Jeff asked, with his mouth full.
“Nothing.”
“Whatdya mean nothing? It’s gotta be about something.”
“No it doesn’t.”
Jeff swallowed, then stared at Marlon. “Of course it has to be about something. It’s a novel.”
“I’m a rebel.”
“Oh jeez.” Jeff took another bite. “You’re a slacker, but you aren’t a rebel.”
“I’m a NaNo rebel. I’m writing reality TV in prose.”
“Jesus Christ Marlon.” Jeff leaned back, then gazed at the large, foil-covered pan of pork fried rice between them. Marlon wasn’t directly across, more in the middle of the table. His empty plate was to his left, a laptop in front of him. Since the beginning of October Jeff had been hearing about this writing competition from Hannah; did Jeff want to join them? Them, he had asked, with a smile. Yes, Hannah had smirked, tugging on Marlon’s arm. Her boyfriend was going to write with her in November.
Jeff pulled out his phone to investigate. Participants of National Novel Writing Month were supposed to compose fifty thousand words in thirty days. Jeff stared at Marlon; he could barely write his way out of a paper bag. Yet he hadn’t stopped typing since Jeff had poured himself more apple juice, and that was twenty minutes ago.
Jeff drank what remained in his cup, then finished his lunch. Two nights back, recessed lights were installed in Marlon and Hannah’s kitchen. Workmen had been around all day, and when Jeff and Eileen stopped by to see the results, Chinese food had been ordered. Marlon liked pork fried rice, but what he loved was not having to plan dinner. Hannah had put him in charge of the nightly meal after he got fired two months ago. Since then, Marlon hadn’t looked for a job, spending most of his time watching reality TV programs. Jeff knew this from all of Marlon’s inane texts read as Jeff made UPS deliveries. Every half hour Jeff had been updated on a variety of crap television shows. What Jeff most wanted to know was when Hannah was going to realize that her boyfriend hadn’t done jack squat over the last several weeks.
“That’s why you’re writing, to get on Hannah’s good side,” Jeff said with disdain.
“To stay on her good side,” Marlon smiled, then went back to typing.
“What, you make a bet with her or something?”
“Something,” Marlon mumbled. He looked at Jeff, then to the apple juice container. Then back to his story.
“What, whoever gets to fifty K first wins something?” Jeff glanced at the ceiling; the new lights were bright and modern. Two months ago the landlord had replaced aged tile counters with granite. Three months before that, maple cabinets were installed. “Hey, maybe your rent’s gonna go up. Maybe that’s why the new lights.”
“Nah, he just wants to improve things.” Marlon sat back, then sighed. “You believe the BS they put on apple juice; my dad used to make it in the fifties, blah blah blah. What shit!”
“Just like reality TV,” Jeff smiled.
“Exactly. Advertisers think we have the mental acumen of earthworms. Whatever they sell, we’ll buy.” Marlon wore an icy smile. “Chicks aren’t any different.”
“Yeah?”
“Hannah bugged me about this last year. So this time I said sure, said I’d even beat her. Then she got cocky, bet me a hundred bucks that she’d come up with fifty K before I did. She’s got some wig-ass story all plotted out, and I know she’s been writing at work. She keeps texting me: Check my word count. Last time it was at nineteen thousand something. No way she’s getting all that typed lying in bed next to me.”
Jeff looked at the juice bottle, read the story; was there really a family connected with this particular brand? Or was it just bull as Marlon said?
“So I read the rules; you don’t have to write fiction. You can write whatever the hell you want, so that’s what I’m doing. Yesterday I wrote about how nice the kitchen is now. Today it’s how Hannah’s gonna get her ass fired for writing her novel at work,” Marlon chuckled.
“And if she does, who’s gonna pay the electric bill?” Jeff crossed his arms. Why did he bother with Marlon? Why did Hannah? What drew people like them, who went to work and played by the rules, to those like Marlon, who was happy to do absolutely nothing as long as others allowed. “If you win the bet, you gonna buy dinner for a while?”
Jeff had given Hannah fifteen bucks toward sesame chicken and what he and Eileen ate of the pork fried rice. Jeff didn’t expect Marlon, if he actually won the bet, to part with any of the money other than for beer and the occasional bag of chili and lime sunflower seeds. Why would Hannah bet him one hundred bucks in the first place?
“If I win, the beer’s on me. Now listen, I gotta get back to typing. This’s my life, reality TV-style. If you have something interesting to add, great. Otherwise, don’t let the door hit you on your way back to work.”
“Well, thanks for that warm and fuzzy see you soon.” Jeff rolled his eyes, took his empty plate to the sink, then left his friend’s house with a definite slam behind him.
On the fifteenth of November, Jeff and his girlfriend Eileen brought Indian food to Hannah and Marlon. Hannah’s word count had stalled after she hit twenty K, but Marlon was still on track, at twenty-seven thousand.
After dinner, Eileen and Hannah spoke in the kitchen. Marlon was sprawled across the sofa, a laptop perched on his gut. “So, how’s the book?” Jeff asked.
“Good.” Marlon leaned forward, wearing a crafty smile. “She quit,” he whispered.
“Maybe it’s just writer’s block.” Jeff knew this; Marlon had texted him about Hannah’s slump not long after it became a certainty.
Marlon chuckled. “She gave up. Says she’ll give me the hundred bucks as soon as I reach fifty K.”
Jeff rolled his eyes. “Aren’t you the least bit…” Then Jeff sighed. Of course Marlon didn’t care that Hannah hadn’t been able to muster any more of her story. His only concern was the money.
The women’s voices were soft, but Jeff picked up something serious being discussed, something Hannah had brought up; Eileen was using her I’m so sorry tone. Once they were in the car, he would ask, but for now he was stuck watching Marlon gloat all over his laptop. His fingers flew, probably all shit, Jeff sighed quietly. He watched crap shows, was writing a BS novel. A reality TV novel, and Jeff rolled his eyes again.
“What?” Marlon asked.
“What?”
“I saw that.”
“Saw what?”
“Saw you rolling your eyes. Do you realize how much you do that?”
Only around you, Jeff chuckled to himself. “I didn’t know it was flagrant.”
“If you did it around Eileen, I’d be she’d let you know.”
I never roll my eyes around my girlfriend, Jeff nearly said, but as Hannah’s voice grew louder and more anguished, he kept those thoughts to himself. “So Marlon, how much do you have left?”
“Twenty-three thousand words.”
“No, I mean, how much of your story?”
Marlon looked up, then shook his head. “I told you it’s not a story. It’s just stream of consciousness.”
“No apple juice bottles today,” Jeff smiled.
Marlon sat up, setting the
laptop beside him. He cracked his knuckles, then motioned for Jeff. “I’m writing about how Hannah’s novel’s gone down the toilet.”
Jeff coughed, then cleared his throat. “You’re writing what?”
“She thinks she’s so superior with all this writing, been bugging me about it for ages. So finally I get on board, and she craps out. I love her, don’t get me wrong, but…” He smiled. “Sometimes she just needs to lay off, you know.”
Hannah’s voice increased, sounding even more plaintive.
“Marlon,” Jeff whispered tersely, “she’s right in the next room. This’s important to her, and you’re acting like a ten-year-old.”
“Hey, if she can’t take it, she shouldn’t dish it out.”
Jeff stood, looking around the tidy living room. Marlon still wasn’t working, but he probably hadn’t lifted a finger in the cleaning. Hannah worked all day, then came home to her slob of a boyfriend, who was writing utter swill. For the first time, Jeff wondered why Hannah hadn’t kicked Marlon’s lazy butt to the curb. Or maybe she had tried, and Marlon was impossible to move.
They had been dating for eighteen months, a little longer than Jeff and Eileen. But Jeff was starting to talk marriage, and Eileen was picking up the hints. Hannah and Marlon seemed to be heading the other way, if word counts were indicative of anything.
“Hey, you going in the kitchen?” Marlon asked, resettling into the sofa.
“Yeah.” You want me to apologize on your behalf to Hannah, Jeff felt like saying.
“Can you get me a beer?”
“A beer. You want me to get you a beer.”
“Well, unless you got a broken leg all of a sudden.”
Jeff rolled his eyes. “A beer. Sure Marlon. I’d love to get you a beer.”
Ten days later, on his way home from work, Jeff stopped by Marlon and Hannah’s. Jeff hadn’t spoken to Marlon since handing him that beer. He had kissed Hannah’s cheek, then listened to Eileen all the way home; initially Hannah had been thrilled Marlon was going to write with her, but his callous indifference to the spirit of the competition had stolen her muse. Eileen thought Marlon was a complete asshole and that Hannah should leave him.
Jeff knocked, but no one answered. Maybe he’s writing, Jeff wondered, using his key. “Marlon, Hannah? Hey, if you’re getting it on, I’m here!”
White noise stirred in the background. Jeff poked his nose into the kitchen; the table was covered in styrofoam containers, flies buzzing over the open ones. Empty sunflower seed bags and beer cans littered granite countertops under the bright glare of LED lights.
Jeff turned around slowly, looking back down the corridor. Then he took hesitant steps into the living room; the TV blared, some insipid reality show. “Marlon?”
He lay on the long sofa, dressed only in boxers. Jeff gazed around the house, a few items askew. The kitchen had certainly been the worst, as if Marlon had been left alone since Jeff last saw him. “Marlon, shit man, what’n the hell happened?”
“She left me.”
“She left you?”
“She left me. For him.”
Marlon pointed to the TV; it was a home restoration show. Recessed lights were being installed in someone’s kitchen.
“What the hell are you talking about?” Jeff sat near Marlon’s feet, which were more than a little smelly. When was the last time he had showered?
“Have you looked at her Facebook lately?”
“Uh no, we were at Eileen’s parents for Thanksgiving. Marlon, what’s going on?”
He sat up, stubble on his face, eyes bloodshot. A small paunch hung over his ratty boxers. Marlon was twenty-eight, but looked twice that age. Jeff inhaled; no, his friend hadn’t recently bathed.
“She posted it all on Facebook; she did hit fifty K, wrote some chick-flick crap about a gal who’d been cheating on her longtime boyfriend for the last six months with the owner of her house. That’s why we got the new cabinets and granite counters and fucking recessed lights!”
He threw a bag of sunflower seeds at the TV, the scent of chili and lime wafting as seeds fell to the carpet. The star of the show stood on a ladder, showing how easy it was to set the lights into holes already prepared in the ceiling, just like what had happened a few weeks ago in Marlon’s previously tidy kitchen.
“So, if she left you for him, why’d he put in the lights?”
“The lights are for them. I’m supposed to move out by the end of the month and they’re gonna live here. I guess he left his wife for her, was getting this place all ready. She said he’s writing a novel this month, a real novel. What a bitch!”
Jeff nodded, but wanted to smile. “So what now? I mean, what’re you gonna do?”
“Fuck if I know. I never should’ve agreed to write that stupid story.”
“What does that have to do with anything?”
“Well, if I hadn’t been busy writing, I would’ve seen this coming.”
Jeff laughed. “She’s been sleeping with him for months Marlon, Jesus Christ!”
“Yeah, but if I hadn’t been spending all my free time writing, I’d have been checking out her Facebook more. Or reading her novel; she put up excerpts on her goddamned NaNo page, you realize that?”
Jeff took a long look at his friend; Marlon had spent the last few months sponging off Hannah, wheedling more than a few bucks from Jeff when Hannah said no. Who had paid for all the take-out dishes in the kitchen, he wondered. “I have one question.”
“Just one?”
Jeff chuckled. If not for Eileen, he would probably end up with Marlon on his sofa. Eileen would take a hard stand, even in December, if Hannah’s ultimatum was real.
“Just one question. Who shelled out for all the food in the kitchen?”
“Hannah.”
“Hannah?”
“Well, I did win the bet.”
Jeff nodded slowly. “What bet?”
“You know, the NaNo bet. I hit fifty K before she did.”
Jeff repeated it half to himself. “And she still gave you the hundred bucks?”
“Yup.” Then he looked toward the kitchen. “A broken heart too.”
“Uh-huh.” Jeff doubted that very much. A bruised ego, maybe. “Well, I guess that’s the breaks.”
“The cheating girlfriend story,” Marlon said, looking glum.
“Maybe you can get it published or something.”
“Maybe I’ll do that. I’ll have plenty of time to kill, you know, in December.”
Jeff could hear the request already. He stood, then gazed around the room. “Well, you’ve got till the end of the month here. Good luck man.”
“Yeah, thanks.”
Jeff saw himself to the door, hearing the TV’s volume increase. If Eileen ever asked him about writing a book, Jeff would smile, remembering this day. Then he would kiss his girlfriend and tell her No thanks.
The American Way