Tag: 365 monologues

the problem with drunks is that they’re drunks. they have no nuance. you ask them how their day is and they tell you about the last time they were drunk. which was last night. they don’t mention how they’re drunk now, of course. but they are. that’s all they are. people are simple, i mean, yeah, i said there’s no nuance, but there’s no nuance with anybody. we’re all simple. this idea that we’re complex creatures, that’s just an act. we just want food and sex, and everything we do all dials back to that. so ted, he drinks, and he started drinking because he was trying to get laid. the two of us, i’m the actor, right, so i’ve got all the bravado. we’d go to high school parties together–i’m the senior, he’s the sophomore–and i’d be talking to two, three girls, and i’m just sizing them up, you know, trying to figure out which one i want to sleep with. and teddy … well he’s in the corner, fuming, because he doesn’t have that gift. so instead he drinks, and he drinks, and soon he’s as blotto as dad and now’s his big chance to talk to women. except instead of flirting, he’s just expelling garbage from his mouth. he’s an embarrassment. and of course i have to save his ass, so i take him outside to sober up. in other words, he’s a huge cockblock. now i did this several times–i did this every time he and i were at a party together, in fact, from high school on to college. i realized i got laid more often when i didn’t go to parties with him. because i couldn’t ignore him, you know what i mean? he’s my brother. but he stopped being invited to stuff. i feel bad. he went from a social drunk to an introverted drunk, which only made his alcoholism worse. i’d come home–we lived together in college–i’d come home and he’d be in his bedroom, passed out, or in the bathroom, puking, or passed out. his liver’s gotta be shot by now. i’m surprised he’s not dead…

so, i mean, that’s ted. that’s who he is. not a lot of nuance there. if you’re asking me what his hobbies are, i’d say, “drinking.” he gets disability because his left leg’s a little shorter than his right and when they tried to fix it when he was a kid, they screwed it up, so his left leg’s weak. he gets disability for that. kept him out of kuwait too. plenty of time to sit on his ass and drink fifths of vodka. but if you’re asking me for anything deeper than that, i can’t give you anything, because there’s not anything there. his life is a tower of booze.

johnny. what is johnny? who is he you mean? is that what you’re asking? okay. johnny’s one of those guys that’s hard to pinpoint. he’s an actor, you know, he’s got those chops, he can read a person like a paperback, cover to cover, instantly. you watch him, he’ll enter a room and you watch him introduce himself to someone, he scans ’em, does a once over, and boom, he knows you. you get to talking to him and within five minutes he knows enough info about you to destroy you from the inside out. but johnny, he’s too nice for that. he can’t bring himself to tear a person down. he gets what he wants, sure, but he’ll leave you intact while he goes after it. me, i tore people down, but every time it was like hooking a string to their backs which pulled a bit of my soul outta me. stuff wears you down. nah, johnny’s nice, he’s too nice, he’s this actor but he don’t have any spirit, no, ah, no fire in him. he wanders around like a ghost. you watch him, he’s always wearing white. cause he’s a ghost, see. he loves that symbolism bullshit. people think that makes him superficial but he’s not, that’s the trick. he’s not superficial. if anything he’s too deep. he’s in too deep. he’s swimming in the deep end looking for meaning, and most of the time it nearly drowns him. he’s gotta fight that, so he put son a good face. he acts. he is an actor, after all. johnny loves a person who’s open, loves a guy who will not bullshit him, because he knows he can murder you with whatever information you give him, but by giving it to him, it shows a level of trust.

look at me. talking about my own brother like he’s a polar bear or someshit. johnny’s a good man, he just has trouble relating to people because he’s acting. he wants you to be real but he’s not being real. you get me? if you find a way beyond those defenses, then you will have a friend for life. but it takes time, and it takes effort, and honestly, i don’t even know if it’s worth it.

all of mom’s photos are in a jumble in that box over there. i went through a few of them but there’s thousands in there. it was hard. like. look at all these memories, why did you kill yourself, you have all this beautiful stuff. this beautiful life. two kids, one of whom is doing well for himself. yeah yeah, i know. dad. it’s all dad’s fault. but you know mom, you know how she was. even if dad was a nice guy, she would still have whatever it was swimming around in her head. dad just married her because he settled, because he was a piece of shit. when you’re a piece of shit, your options are limited to “damaged” women. he could control her, he could manipulate her. but even in a loving home, which, you know, after dad died, she had. she had a loving home. these last few years were us practically strangling her with love. and yet, she’s dead, he’s dead, the house is gone. you’re a drunk and i’m a failed actor. the sun rises, the sun sets. we die and get turned into worm food. what i’m saying is: maybe this is supposed to be. maybe her suicide was fate, written into her bloodstream, little morse code dots flashed in chemicals in her brain. something was misfiring. it misfires in all of us, ted. we are the chaff of a dysfunctional family, ted. we wanted to be the wheat but we are definitely the chaff.

alright. i’m a superhero. is that what you wanted to hear? wanted me to come clean, did you? well here i am, squeaky clean! i’m the masked marauder. not a name i came up with, though all good nicknames are never made by the person. you get what i mean. superman, batman. batman never called himself “bat man,” everyone else did. the name stuck. see, i wouldn’t consider myself a marauder so much as a vigilante, one who uses his superpowers to help avenge the crimes that are overlooked by the police. am i lawful? no. have i killed a few people in my line of duty? yes. again, not like batman or superman in that respect. i think if people are too bad, they need to be put down. but does that make me any worse than you average police officer who kills innocent people left and right? of course not. am i better than the cops who murdered tamir rice? yes. absolutely. definitely. will the disenfranchised people rally around that? yes. and they should. because i am taking care of their issues, and i will always help them no matter what you try to do to me. because all of you in here know that i could break through these chains and snuff your lives out without a second thought. but i don’t. because i’m better than that. i’m a superhero, not a supervillain. so do us all a favor and release me, so that i can continue my work.

everyone thinks their life is the definitive one. and they should! because you don’t know anyone else’s life except your own. it’s why i think people do so much with their lives, because no matter how hard you try, you’ll never be another person, and i think there’s a loneliness in realizing that. you know, on an atomic level, you never actually touch anything? weird, huh? your collection of atoms comes close to the collection of atoms on a desk or whatnot, but they never actually touch, cause of the molecular bonds and because of the electron cloud. that newspaper you’re holding, you’re never going to touch it. that woman you love, you can hug her as hard as possible but you’ll never touch her. even if you make love to her, you’re not touching. crazy, huh? in the grand scheme of things, you are alone in your own mind. some people can’t take that, they gotta be around people all the time, to fill up that sense of dread. others, like me, well i can hang out under this bridge and sing little songs to myself and entertain myself and whatnot, and i’ll be fine. everyone’s different. point is, i don’t get mad when people yell at me or tell me i should get a job, because the way i figure it, those people have had decades of a life that’s so different from mine, ain’t no way we’ll be on the same page. even people that love me, even people that say they’re gonna help, they don’t know, they’ll never know me, never know what goes on inside this head of mine. so damn right i should think my life is the most important one! it’s the only one i know!

fortunately, everyone is dead. except trevor. fucking guy will not die, no matter how hard we try. mary shot him right in the head, right between the eyes, and the bullet just spun on his forehead and then clattered to the ground. but everyone else, dead. at least we have that, right doc? trevor’s an exception, he’s an anomaly, maybe his skull is made of titanium, i don’t know. he can still speak, he’s not a zombie or anything like that. he just can’t be killed. so, i don’t know what to do. oh mary splashed acid on him and it didn’t burn his face off. maybe it’s a shield or a a a a force field, maybe he’s got a force field around him. i’ll ask mary next time i see her. thing is, with everyone else dead, it kind of doesn’t matter if trevor’s alive or dead anyway. the man’s an idiot, there’s no way he’s got the brainpower to keep an entire story like this one in his head, you know what i mean? he’s an idiot, he’s also immortal. so we’re going to have to deal with that eventually, but when it comes to this mass genocide thing, i think we can let it slide, don’t you? maybe we’ll find a loophole that’ll let us cut his head off or something. i’ll talk to mary, she knows all the tips and tricks regarding killing people. it’s kind of weird, how much she knows. anyway! the earth is yours, except for trevor. but i’m sure you can deal with trevor.

[This is a story written from the a prompt on Reddit’s WritingPrompts subreddit. (which is why it’s not all lowercase as usual.) The prompt (and all of its typos) is: People only grow old amd die when they found their own purpose in life. You have lived for a millenia and you notice a strand of your gray hair.]

I stepped inside the remains of the enormous, empty warehouse. Dust a quarter inch thick displaced into deep footprints as my soft shoes pattered against the concrete, leaving the faintest echo in the completely barren room. I met the Shaman there — my name for him, not his — a thin, bronze-colored man with leathery skin, wearing a gray flannel shirt and blue jeans, nothing else. He was sitting cross-legged in the center of the warehouse, eyes closed, in some type of meditation. But he opened his eyes when I arrived, and smiled gently at me.

“Finally, you come seeking answers,” he said. He stood, lifting himself off the ground with a spry step. He looked old, ancient even, with thin white hair and cloudy blue eyes, his face gaunt and stretched tight against his skull. Almost like he was wearing a mask. “Look at you,” he said. “You don’t look like you’ve aged one bit.” He laughed and stepped close to me, studying my face, running a bony hand through my dark brown hair. Tugged on my earlobes. “Yes, not a day since … well.”

“How do you know who I am?” I asked.

“The longer a man lives, the more likely he is to be known,” the man replied. “And when a man lives a thousand years, his name echoes in many chambers. I bet you didn’t expect to find an old ascetic like me in the ruins of the Newark Port Authority, did you?” he said, and grinned. He was missing more than a few teeth. (more…)

listen, i don’t know who these fucking retards are that only eat unsalted butter, but they are idiots and i do NOT want unsalted butter in my house! do you hear me? take it back! take it back and tell the customer service lady that unsalted butter is an abomination to mankind. why would you get something without salt in it? huh? huh? huh? huh? huh? tell me that, tell me why, why, huh? salt. it’s good for everything. you got a problem with your food? put some salt on it. hell you got a problem with your caramel? put some god damn salt in it. salted caramel! salted chocolate! salted taffy! SALT WATER TAFFY. we fucking, we put salt in EVERYTHING, and i’ll be god damned before i use unsalted butter in some of my favorite baking recipes. i see fear in your eyes because you’re scared of me. there’s nothing to be scared of, honey, i’m just passing along the truth to you. the truth is that for hundreds of years people had to eat food without salt added to it and those people were depressed and died in childbirth, and that’s just not okay. it’s not okay! so please take the receipt with you and make sure you get 100% salted butter. this is not an unsalted house!

i’ve got three dogs. three big dogs, all in the backyard. now i know my dogs like the back of my hand, i love my dogs, and i know they wouldn’t do something like that, not to a little kid. i mean if that kid got in my backyard, the dogs, they are very protective because that’s their home, you know what i’m saying, but they’ve been chained up all day and there’s no way they’d get outside the fence. that kid’d hafta come into my backyard. and even then how’d he get out? if he got in how’d he get out? you know? my dogs are good dogs, i don’t care what the neighbors say, they’re just scared, all of ’em. yeah sure sometimes they bark at night, i can’t help it, they see a squirrel or something and they start barking–but that’s the most they’ve ever done. they’d never hurt a kid, not a little kid. so you just pick up on out of here, got it? i got nothing else to say to any of you, y’all are looking at me like it’s my fault, i see the guilt in your eyes. other people in this town have dogs too god damn it! and nastier ones than my three boys. now get out of here! no more questions! get!