Brain Food

BRAIN FOOD

by

J. Joseph Wright

Text copyright 2012 by J. Joseph Wright

Cover copyright 2012 by. Krystle Wright

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental (and would be quite frightening, to say the least).

I want the world to read Brain Food. If you’d like to share it with your friends, feel free. Just don’t make a material gain off of it, because that would constitute copyright infringement. Thank you, J.

1.

Blink. Blink. Blink.

The cursor taunted him. It toyed like a disaffected lover, heaping misery upon heartbreak, and reducing him to a mere shell of his former self.

Blink. Blink. Blink.

The cursor shamed him. It bled him dry day after day, draining him of his will slowly, stealing his confidence little by little.

Blink. Blink. Blink.

He hated that fucking cursor. Why did it have to stare? Why did it have to flash again and again, making him feel worthless, stripping every single shred of his dignity one motherfucking blink at a time? He wanted to shout. He wanted to stand up and punch the goddam keyboard right off his desk and stomp the screen in half. Then he wanted to dropkick his computer out the fucking window. But he couldn’t. It was the only computer he owned, and he had to get something written.

Blink. Blink. Blink.

His mind was blank. He didn’t want to admit it. Never wanted to admit it. He glanced up at his Writer’s Guild Award, the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer, the Isaac Asimov Award for Science Fiction. All won in ’04, all the pinnacle of his career. He stood and tapped his forehead on the Asimov three times.

“Okay, Ike. Help me out, here,” he reached for a slice of papaya, devouring its sweet, orangish flesh. “Writer to writer, okay, old buddy? Give me an idea. Just one,” he leaned again. “Just one.”

He slurped on another piece of papaya, then drank from the giant tumbler he’d left precariously close to the electronics. A Southeast Asian concoction—kale, soy milk, and lots of avocado for Omega-3 fatty acids. Not too tasty, but the natives in Ea Bông
swore by its mind-augmenting properties.

Didn’t do shit, though.

Blink. Blink. Blink.

“FUCK!” he threw a double-fisted punch at his twenty-five inch flatscreen, intent on slamming the fucker across the room. His clenched fists inches from the glass, he stopped. No matter how pissed he got, no matter how blocked he became, he was still too much of a pussy to stop writing and get a real job.

Then his computer went black. Not blank. Black. The screen popped with a blinding light, then darkened, crackling and fizzling.

“What happened! Who turned off the power!”

From upstairs, in the master bedroom, came her shrill cackle. He cringed at her voice, looking for somewhere to run. Too late.

His office door burst open and in she strode, all purple spandex, plastic tits, and counterfeit blonde. “What the hell did you do, Stan?” she put hands on her hips. “You didn’t pay the electricity bill, did you?”

He bit his tongue a little. He knew this day would come.

“Let me guess,” she tapped her foot. “You didn’t pay because you couldn’t pay, right?” she eyed him up and down. “Look at you. You used to be hot. You used to be Stanley Cox, New York Times Bestselling Author. What happened? You haven’t had a decent idea in years. You’ve been sliding further and further into this-this depression, and it’s killed our relationship. I mean, when the sex went, that was one thing. I could live without the sex. But money? I can’t live without money, Stan.”

He wanted to say something, list the reasons why she would have been stupid for leaving. He couldn’t think of anything even halfway redeeming. The writer’s block had eaten a hole into his work, now it had crept into his life, rotting it all into dust.

“What’s the matter, Stan? Can’t think of something witty or charming to sweep me back off my feet? That’s what you used to do, you know? You swept me off my feet with your words. You swept the whole
world
off its feet with your words. They had magic, Stan. Magic. Where’s the magic now? What happened to you?”

He rubbed his eyes, then opened a jar of supplements and downed several straight, chasing it with another sip of nutrition shake.

“That stuff’s not gonna do anything, Stan. Christ’s sake, can’t you see that?” she cast a derisive glance at the minibar next to his desk, an assortment of the latest in his search for a remedy to the goddam writer’s block. “How long have you been trying this shit? It’s gotten you nowhere. Worse than nowhere, because you’ve spent a fortune. That and the fact you’ve made nothing, not a penny in years. I can’t believe I stayed with you. I should have listened to my mother and left a long time ago.”

Stan watched as she stomped upstairs in a haughty huff. Finally, he mustered the balls to come up with a response.

“You’re wrong, Vanessa!” he shouted. “I know there’s something that’ll help me get past this!” he lowered his voice, talking to himself. “There’s something out there. Something that’ll get me out of this damned slump.”

“Slump?” she stood in the hall, a Louis Vuitton suitcase strapped over her shoulder. She still had on her workout wear. “You call this a slump? Stan, they just turned off the power. The bank’s been sending letters for months. Don’t think I didn’t see them. I did. And I know you haven’t opened a single one, either. You’re in trouble, Stan. And I’m leaving.”

Rat deserting a sinking ship
, he thought as she slammed the door.
Painted, plastic, and pampered rat.

2.

Guzzle. Guzzle. Gulp.

He’d long ago forsaken any pretense of using a shot glass, commencing to copious swigs from the bottle. Gone were the days when he could afford the good stuff. Several thousands of dollars for single malt scotch was a thing of the past, so shitty
Johnny Walker Red
it was. Tasted like piss. Went down like fire. Did the trick.

Guzzle. Guzzle. Gulp.

BAM! BAM! BAM! BAM!

He curled up tight, trying to keep his brain from rattling against the walls of his skull. It sounded like a freight train passing in the night, though he knew there were no railways anywhere near that part of Malibu.

BAM! BAM! BAM! BAM!

“Stop it!” he yelled, and then winced as soon as he yelled it, a ringing, burning sensation gushing through his cerebrum. “Ouch,” he lowered his voice to a whisper, then yelled again. “Go away!”

“It’s the Sheriff’s Department!”

He perked up, his pulse a mile a minute. Did he have anything in the house? Coke? Pot? Where was that goddam crack pipe Vanessa’s stupid fucking niece brought over last weekend?

“Just a minute!”

“Stanley Cox?”

“Yeah.”

“Sorry to inform you, Mister Cox, but we have an eviction notice, here.”

He stumbled to the front double doors, custom-crafted mahogany with wrought iron grills and frosted crystal. He was greeted by four deputies with a big stinking piece of paper, all kinds of stuff written in legalese basically telling him the place was owned by the bank now. He had to get the hell out.

“Okay,” he told a deputy, late twenties, well-groomed but not overly military like Stan had noticed most cops had become. “I just need some time to make arrangements for my belongings. How’s next week? Thursday good?”

“Sir, I don’t think you understand. You have to go. Now.”

Stunned beyond words, throat as dry as hell, head throbbing, he staggered to the last thing he owned besides a couch and loveseat combo—his 2005 Chevrolet Corvette z06. Smoke gray, leather, faster than a Ferrari. He loved that car.

The deputies went room-to-room, closing and fastening windows. They then asked Stan for all the keys to the residence and locked the place tight, even going so far as to run tape across the front and back doors of Stan’s castle. Five thousand square feet, 360 degree ocean and mountain views, pool with spa and tons of privacy—a premium in Malibu. Now it was gone. He emptied his lungs and folded against the car. At least he still had the car.

Before the cops left, the one who’d first served him with the papers approached, hat in hand.

“Listen, Mister Cox,” he looked over his shoulder. “I’m not supposed to tell you this, but my son is a big fan of your book,” he paused, struggling for words. “The credit agency’s sending a truck over right now to impound your Vette. Sorry, man.”

Then they got in their cruisers and drove away.

“Hell with that!” Stan shouted loud enough for all Serrano Valley to hear. He found himself on Pacific Coast Highway within five minutes. Two hours later, he arrived at the Mexican border.