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Doing the things (Snippets, Oneshots, and Ideas thread)

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Well, that was a thing that happened.

Ya know, you think the GET OVER HERE moments would have gotten his family to be a bit more polite, while thinking of him as even more of a freak. Especially if the effects of using them in impale mode got shown off on Marge's dog at some point.
 
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Trailblazing
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    • Would it be pretentious to say it started out small, like most things do? Or maybe, self-aggrandizing to say I had the best of intentions, even at my lowest points? Or maybe-- wait, no, back up. I don't think I'm using 'aggrandizing' right… fuck. I had a word for this. I had, like, a whole thing prepared. I had a monologue you could set to dramatic music and it'd be like the teaser trailer for a sweet new movie. Shit. It's gone now.

    Uh.

    Look, the important thing is that it started, that's really all that matters in the grand scheme of things. I mean, the stuff afterwards is important too, but it wouldn't be there if I hadn't tried taking the back entrance to Winslow High one day all the way back in, like, October.

    I'd spotted a glint of red hair loitering near the main doors of the school, thanks to a well-timed sunbeam peeking through the grey haze that is Brockton Bay's skies at least 60% of the year. It could have just been a shaft of red light glinting off of blonde hair, owing to it allegedly being dawn somewhere past the clouds, because some old white fuck somewhere thought it was a great idea to get teenagers awake and herded into stone prisons before anything approaching a reasonable hour. So it might not have been Emma lying in wait for me, but I didn't feel like taking that risk that day. So I swerved right and started the march through the cold to get to the other side of the school building, and huddled in a corner nook about halfway around, I spotted a group of kids taking a smoke break before class. A breeze confirmed my suspicions that it wasn't tobacco smokes, either.

    And that's when the thing happened that kicked off the future: I changed direction and walked over to them. I think I half-expected them to sneer and curse at me, since I was already well on my way to having "Pariah" replace my name in the school yearbook, but they didn't. I stopped a few feet from them and did a sort of awkward shuffle. "Hey."

    "'Sup," one replied.

    "You're smoking weed behind the school?" My powers of observation were great even then, I know.

    "Gotta problem with it?"

    "...what's it like?" I asked instead. Maybe they were already mellowed enough to start feeling generous, or more likely the upperclassman was already in the Merchants and knew an easy mark when he saw one. Either way he beckoned me over and held out the group's current blunt. I hesitated, visions of the old D.A.R.E programs playing through my head, but walked over to them and took the joint in clumsy fingers. He made a 'go on' sort of gesture, so I took a steadying breath (stupid, I know), then took my first pull of herbal inhalant. Then I had my first coughing fit that was so bad, I nearly puked, and I'm pretty sure I did pee a little.

    "Holy shit, you've never smoked have you? Ha haaa, oh man! We're poppin' a cherry here!" The whole group was laughing, and someone was slapping me on the back as I choked on my own lameness. I used my sleeve to scrub tears and snot off my face as Upperclassman Merchant continued, "Okay, okay, no worries-- that happens to everyone first time. Mikey even threw up on his shoes."

    "Screw you, Don."

    "So yeah-- get your breath back, then take a small drag, and try to hold it. Then blow, get your breath back, and do it again, got it?" Don handed me back the joint, I guess he'd stolen it back while I coughed to keep me from dropping it. He pulled another from his coat and lit up, took a drag, and passed it to his friends, so I guessed the half-joint I was holding was officially mine. I followed Don's guidance, and eventually thanked the only group of kids who'd willingly and on purpose interacted with me in months. Greg and Emma's Posse don't count. Then I decided that I was skipping Mrs. Knott's computer class and heading to the cafeteria instead, because holy shit pancakes sounded so good right now.

    Pancakes are always good, so that really shouldn't have been a surprise, but right then they were the most important thing in the world. Screw worrying about Emma, I needed a maple syrup IV, stat. I needed it so bad, I forgot that Winslow's cafeteria didn't even have pancakes, and I spent a good 20 minutes wandering the halls because I'd also somehow lost track of where the cafeteria was. I blame the fact that I couldn't stop squinting, for some reason. I blame that for almost running into Emma, too.

    Literally. I hadn't qute connected the bell ringing to the hallways suddenly being filled with students, and I got bounced around a bit between shoulders, and took refuge from the human tide next to Emma's locker. I think it was Emma's locker. I don't know for sure, I only thought that because Emma was standing next to it, and she gave me a look like I'd stepped in dog shit.

    "Ugh. Go away, Taylor, you're getting your greasy skin everywhere. Someone should bug bomb you, I bet you're crawling with lice. Hey, maybe I'll tell the nurse I saw some, and she can cut your hair off to make sure you're not spreading parasites to everyone, hmm?"

    "That would suck," I said, and tossed myself back into the bumper-car simulation that was the hallway. Bumper cars, like at that pizza and arcade place Mr. Barnes took Emma and I to for her 10th birthday. Pizza sounded so good right now, holy shit. I started looking for the chemistry lab instead, because I couldn't find the cafeteria and I needed to create a hybrid of pizza and pancake. I would do science to them.

    Some time later, as I was filling the pizzacake-shaped void in my soul with my bagged lunch instead, three things occurred to me:

    One, that I was eating my lunch for breakfast, hiding in the gym locker room because I was supposed to be in Math class;

    Two, that I had been threatened by Emma to get my one positive feature removed out of spite and lies, and I hadn't given a single fuck about it;

    And three, that this was why everyone said not to do drugs. Because they were awesome.

    * * *

    So, I've never been one to do things by half. Striking up a partnership with good ol' Mary Jane was no exception. The whole 'reefer madness' thing they used to (and sometimes still do) crow about is pretty much bullshit, if you're curious, and the science says Marijuana has a pretty low physical dependency profile. Mental dependency, though? Debateable, but in my case, I embraced addiction whole-heartedly. A quick means to completely de-stress and let the bullying slide off me like water from a duck's back? Hell yes please. Call it a crutch if you want, but my life was a broken leg by that point already. I had found a means to keep walking and I was going to use it.

    I found Don again a few days later, and he smiled when he saw me coming, because in retrospect the 'Merchant knows an easy mark' guess was pretty much spot-on. His enthusiasm waned a bit pretty quickly, because I wasn't there to ask for a freebie. I had questions, lots of questions. I wanted the terminology, I wanted to know about weights, and prices, and tools. I wanted to know about potency, and how long a high lasts, etcetera etcetera. Like I said, I don't do things by half. I'm pretty sure he thought I was hoping to report him to the teachers, or the police. My terrible reputation actually worked in my favor, though, because clearly the teachers didn't give a shirt about me, and clearly I had legit reasons for wanting to be mellow. I eventually convinced him that I was way too inexperienced to be duplicitous, and he agreed to sell to me. I bought a dime bag of weed, and he showed me how to roll a joint properly.

    So, here's something I didn't clue into until later: weed is harvested right around the start of fall, so going off of basic supply/demand dynamics, it's cheaper to get in the autumn than in summer. Don was crafty enough to pack those dime bags pretty full for his new customer, enough for four joints if I rolled them thin, so I established a routine pretty quickly. I'd hand over my allowance, Don would hand over a little sandwich bag with a fat nug of green, and I'd treat myself to a sandwich and some chips to go with my after-school high.

    I initially set a rule for myself, No Smoking Before School, and kept the joints strictly as a reward for lasting through the day. My attendance actually went up, I started doing some chores for neighbors for a couple extra bucks, and Dad, seeing this, increased my weekly allowance to a whole $15. Score. Life actually got kinda tolerable for one Taylor Hebert. Even better, by December, Emma and her Posse had actually eased up on me. Sure, they were still raging cunts, but they'd cut down on the rage part a bit and didn't actively seek me out as often. Attacks of opportunity were still game, but thanks to having double-period Biology on Tuesdays and Thursdays, I barely saw the trio those days now that they weren't actually setting up ambushes out of their way. I amended my rule to allow for a Wake and Bake if I didn't use my After School High the day before.

    But then, inevitably, the world moved to crush my happiness.

    "What's this?" I asked Don, holding up the dime bag with the distinctly not fat nug of green inside it. "That's not enough. What gives?"

    "It's a dime bag, genius. Set price instead of by weight, remember?" I scowled at him. Don rolled his eyes like an asshole. "Prices went up, so I gotta sell higher. Tough shit."

    "But this is like half of what you sold me just last week!"

    "Like I said: tough shit. Guess you need two bags a week now. Gonna pony up?"

    He had me over a barrel and he knew it. I couldn't ask my father for more money and there weren't that many neighbors who'd pay me to shove a sidewalk, even if it snowed every week. "I don't have that kind of cash," I ground out between my teeth.

    "That sucks, then," Don said, and put on his best aloof expression. It wasn't very good. "Though, if you're interested… I know a guy who could use some errands run."

    I was skeptical, but also interested. And also kind of worried. "What sort of errands?"

    "Nothing major, just take a few packages around town sometimes. Like delivering pizza, easy." There was no way he was being literal and we both knew it. Don was a Merchant, his contact was a Merchant, so those 'deliveries' had to be drugs. Or guns. Or guns stuffed with drugs. No way, I was not getting into that.

    Don reached into his backpack and pulled out a deck of cards, with a little bit of tape keeping the lid sealed. "Stuff like this. Quick and easy, probably just two, three times a week. Thirty bucks each."

    Wait-- thirty to ninety dollars a week? That was more than a month's allowance, and for what? A couple hours and a bus pass or two? I could start and end every day feeling good and put away plenty to buy regular, non-illegal stuff that I liked. I could get an mp3 player by New Year's, even. I told him I didn't want to do anything dangerous. He said he could set me on an easy, safe courier route.

    Goddamn, Don conned me hard. Looking back, this shit is just embarrassing. I'm honestly disappointed in myself. I did get that mp3 player, though, and a cool new watch for Dad for Christmas, since I decided to double-down on running errands during the winter break. Dad thought I was at the library, enjoying the internet, and sometimes I even was. Mostly I was on various busses or sidewalks, earbuds in place and my hands tucked around a wrapped delivery in my hoodie. I don't stand out much, it was easy work.

    First day back in January, I found Don and the guys I never learned their names, having a quick smoke circle around the side of the school. I was already pretty mellow from my morning routine, but nostalgia and networking and all that crap, so I sidled on up.

    "'Sup Taylor," Mikey greeted me, because I lied. "You hungry?"

    "Duh," I said. He handed me a brownie. Mikey was a good guy.

    "Shit, man, warn people first." One of the guys I didn't lie about not knowing said, eyes wide. "She even done edibles before?"

    "Oooooh… yeah. Forgot. Sorry, Taylor."

    "Why would you apologise for giving me chocolate?" I sucked fudge streaks off my fingers. He'd baked that thing with a ton of butter, it was glorious.

    "Holy Christ she ate the whole thing."

    "Well this should be fucking hilarious."

    "Uh, Tay? You'd better, like, go home. Now." Like I said-- Mikey was a good guy. A lot smarter than me in some respects. Not nearly forceful enough, though.

    "First day back, if I skip Blackwell will call my dad. Anyway, I gotta get to my locker, so, tl;dr version of why you're staring at me like that?"

    "You are going to be so fucked up in an hour or so, seriously." Mikey and Don gave me a quick rundown of why I should not have done this. Lesson learned: eating weed is a lot different than smoking it. Also, don't accept candy from strangers. I should have known.

    "Okay, so… I'll turn in some homework and say I ate undercooked eggs for breakfast, then go home." It seemed like an okay plan. It probably even was, but… it kind of hinged on one thing. Namely, that Emma and her Posse had not decided to turn the Raging Cunts back up to 11. Alternatively, that I had the reflexes and paranoia necessary to avoid such.

    The locker door clicking shut behind me, with me inside it, was a pretty resounding "No" to both. After a couple of months of relative peace, of having a coping mechanism, such as it was? The reality that set in at that moment hit harder than the past year combined. I don't think there are words for what I felt there. Fear, certainly. Horror. Disgust. Hate. The shapes of the words and letters isn't enough, not then and not now.

    Still not sure if that was the best or worst possible time for the brownie to kick in, but-- goddamn. I saw some shit, let me tell you. Not even the shape of the words for it was left by the time I woke up, strapped to a hospital bed and with my dad sitting next to me, looking like someone had aged him ten years in ten hours. I had a head full of numbers, and pictures, instead. And one new, overpowering desire, to find Mikey and get another brownie. But not to eat it.

    I was going to do science to it.
     
  • Threadmarks
    • That's certainly... different.

    I like. :V
     
    The Martian, combined with Breaking Bad, combined (probably) with Half Baked, and a little dash of QA in there to halp things along? This'll be good.
     
    I never thought I would see a well done and enjoyable Merchant!Taylor, but now I have and this is awesome.
     
    I want to see a Merchant!Taylor who is an actual merchant. Her power is to tell how much anything is worth exactly... but does it in terms of medieval bargaining terms.

    "How could you say she's not effective! Shadow Stalker's help is priceless!"

    "Eh, seven cows, two chickens, a goat, and two copper pieces."

    "Fuck you, Hebert, I'm worth at least two goats!"
     
    Eh. I like it like I like all your writing (because you're damn good at what you do), but the whole topic is a massive turnoff to the point I can't see how you could possibly make it interesting.

    To me, I mean. Obviously. There's bound to be plenty of people who like things like this.
     
    What the hell, @UnwelcomeStorm? Why do you have to write all these amazing snips? Now I want all of them, and I can't have. I am a sad...

    Edit: because a single typo makes me sound like an illiterate twit
     
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    So I've had a horrible idea for something casual and experimental. A new Worm CYOA came out recently, you see. And I don't think I've ever seen a quest SI.

    Thus, my thoughts:

    1)Worm SI on one of the paths I've never actually seen-- the Endbringer route.
    2)Direct/meta tone, being fully aware of polling SV for advice, and holding a bit of a one-sided conversation with the thread.
    3)If possible, set up an independent alliance with some participating authors to post Interludes, thus shaping the scenario beyond the SI/Author's control.

    I'll repost this in my snippet threads for a wider range of responses, but-- thoughts? I've never had a taste for SIs or CYOAs, but it kind of sounds like it could be interesting.
     
    UnwelcomeStorm said:
    So I've had a horrible idea for something casual and experimental. A new Worm CYOA came out recently, you see. And I don't think I've ever seen a quest SI.

    Thus, my thoughts:

    1)Worm SI on one of the paths I've never actually seen-- the Endbringer route.
    2)Direct/meta tone, being fully aware of polling SV for advice, and holding a bit of a one-sided conversation with the thread.
    3)If possible, set up an independent alliance with some participating authors to post Interludes, thus shaping the scenario beyond the SI/Author's control.

    I'll repost this in my snippet threads for a wider range of responses, but-- thoughts? I've never had a taste for SIs or CYOAs, but it kind of sounds like it could be interesting.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...

    Someone did one of those a while back I think. Something minion based where they overran africa. I forget the name.
     
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    I like the idea of 2 and 3. Maybe even having the SI react to the character creation choices for the CYOA.
    My main problem with CYOAs is they tend to be poorly written or not entertaining in general, especially as being used as a fix-fic.
    All the ones I have liked are short and stopped updating after truly catching my interest.

    As I tend to have enjoyed most of what you have written so far, I feel you could do a good job with one.
    I think the idea of independents writing interludes to have the world develop further independent of the questors sounds like it could be great if executed well.
     
    I have yet to find a CYOA I've like, but writing a self aware self insert quest sounds interesting... especially if he somehow had the ability to see his own thread and talk to his audience.
     
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