Acceleration

Within a month of launching The Literary Brothel, Parker and I realized that there was no way were going to be able to write one piece a week all by ourselves without becoming more redundant than we already were...becoming. We immediately contacted everyone we knew who had an interest in literature or liked to talk. Luckily, my old friend Teddy likes to do both, and agreed to submit some pieces. Here's one of his best. -KV


ACCELERATION
by Teddy Nutmeg

"There's more to life than just increasing its speed." Said someone, I forget who.

Moving on, moving on, 30,000 feet somewhere over Indiana (or is it Kansas?--central time, anyway, what happened to eastern?) and she won't let me go. Its been two moons since Lara's exit stage left and her newly vacated niche in my soul can no longer be ignored - its angry voice gains strength like a semi down a steep grade, brakes out, driver asleep at the wheel.

Accelerating out of control, my life has a will of its own, busying itself with meetings and dinners and flights to locations unknown to the conscious mind. When I think for myself, all I can think about is her. No, that's not quite right. When I am myself, all I am is her, anymore.

My hard boiled shell is cracking-I'm no Phillip Marlowe. The tough-guy mask I make in order to hide from myself is falling apart. That's the problem with paper mache and hasty resolutions; quick to make but quicker to crumble.

Moving on, we're on mountain time now, no, make that pacific, mountain was back there, pal, back when you had time to write some words on a digital tablet owned (like you) by the Great American Insurance Company.

When she left, the great company had me across the country, limbs on puppet strings, dancing and singing for the man to get richer. I had a new career, a new gold card, a new haircut, new clothes and a new emptiness, but no time to grieve. I had no time to wade through dark loneliness and come out stronger. I sat in the darkness and made myself see only light. Just the new job, concentrate all on just the new job. Like a shipping box once you take out the contents, I had a million styrofoam concerns which falsely filled her place in my psyche, but insubstantial, mostly air, these just take up space, they can't occupy it.

Moving on, moving too fast for me to react, like a superbike rider I'm barely aware of where I am - just trying to hang on and guide the ride in a general direction. Three days back in San Diego and my watch is still set to central time. No wonder I've been so early.

Home and a lull, and God how I miss her. Her shadow, her presence still haunts the apartment which is no longer ours; her scent lingers on the walls and her image is everywhere. Strands of long black hair wrap around my bare feet as I shuffle past the couch we shared, the bed we made love in, the life we made together. I miss her tangibility, forever hugs and hands held and the smell of her hair in my face. I wake up and she's not there. I come home and its too quiet. I cook and I make too much. The couch is too big for one, I catch myself sitting in her spot (her butt-dimple is still there) and then realize that she won't rag me for it. I wish she would.

Moving on, across the country, wondering when I can see her next, wondering if she'll ever return my calls again, touch my face again, let me drink from her lips again. My body screams for her touch, but it's getting hoarse. I wonder if she can still hear it? Home Friday night at 11:45, leave Sunday at 2 on a wasted sunny day. Moving on, moving on.

I emerge from the metallic cocoon of a 747 into sweet Kentucky air, everywhere green, and a momentarily clear head. I remember being 5 in Nebraska and the air tasted like this. Humid, summer days sticky like a popsicle stick and just as sweet. Little league and my big brother playing left field, facing away from the plate with his mitt on his head. Castles in the sandbox until the storm sirens sound, then everybody crowds down to the basement to play hearts and Parcheesi and ping-pong. My castles are always worn and pitted and washed away by the rain when we emerge.

Moving on, fast forwarding through the first summer of my corporate career, alternating between not having time to think about her and not having time to think about anything else. The forced introspection on long flights catches up with me over Arizona, and I break down when I realize what I've chosen, when I realize that I am responsible. I've chosen the gold card, the new TV and DVD player, and the Sony Playstation 2. I've chosen short days and shorter nights in places like Burnet, Texas and Magnolia, Arkansas. I've chosen Van Heusen polo shirts and Tommy khakis and Gap leather belts. Laptops and databases and hostile accountants in back offices. Ikea and Best Buy are my significant others now.

I'd take one caress from her gold-skinned hand over golden plastic any day; her currency is the hardest. If only I could knock over a liquor store and take home a loot bag full of Lara.

After she moved out we still saw each other , I'd take her around to run errands, just to spend time with her, and I always would end up driving back to the apartment and getting out of the car like everything was fine, forgetting that the apartment no longer was her home. She'd gently remind me that she didn't live there anymore, and it would come like a kick in the face for the hundredth time; Lara left. But for that blissful couple of minutes while I drove home, everything was fine, me and my baby were just going home to settle in for the night and have some dinner, maybe some drinks, and afterward we'd lay down together. There were a thousand little things I loved about her that won't let me go.

Moving on, airport to airport, hotel to hotel. Empty smiles and "have a good stay, sir" intensify the isolation of the road, and not even the bottom of a bottle helps anymore. Rental cars all have that same smell and it reminds me of our trip to Montreal every time I drive one. Moving on, moving faster, my life is accelerating and it is leaving me standing alone in the middle of the road, frowning in between two peel-out skidmarks, breathing burned rubber and wondering where the sweet air has gone and what Lara is doing tonight. Moving on…

-Teddy Nutmeg, 2001

Horror Movies

Here's a poem submitted last year from Kevin Eno that we never got around to putting up. Did you think we were going to post really old stuff first then post more modern stuff? So did we. But Kevin kept bugging us, so here's his freakin' poem. (Just kidding, Kevin. We like it a lot. Seriously. -KV)

Horror Movies
by Kevin Eno

The fake blood shouldn't scare you

Not half as much

As what they put on your

Ten-dollar tub of popped corn

Or how much you paid

To get into the multi-plex

Theatre built on an ancient

Burial ground

Or the parents

Who came to the

Ten o'clock show with their

Three year old son

And newborn baby

Or the fact that

The kid who tore your ticket

Didn't graduate high school

Or what was in

The hotdog

You just ate

What should really scare you

Is how much

You can relate

To the antagonist

K E V I N E N O

Flip a Towel

"Flip a Towel" was originally published in November of 2001, and quickly became one of the most popular pieces on the site. As far as we know, it was the first Brothel piece to be posted on websites beyond www.literarybrothel.com.

Because of this - and NOT because I'm strangely proud of the creative writing I did as a 24yr old - it has earned a spot as the first piece resurrected here on the new home for The Literary Brothel. It has been edited from its original publication, but obviously not much. Enjoy. -KV


FLIP A TOWEL
by Klaus Varley

My friend Dan uses a different towel every day of the week. He steps out of the shower, dries himself, uses the towel, and throws it in the hamper. Seven days, seven showers, seven towels. On Sunday, he washes them.

"Isn't that a waste?" I ask, genuinely concerned with the environment and/or the real victim of this calamity: his battered, over-washed towels, thinned through the years by a cycle of ultra-cleanliness.

"I just don't want to wipe my face where I wiped my ass the day before," he states, not with his usual disdain for my ignorance, but with the sincerity of a friend coaxing his alcoholic roommate into attending his first AA meeting.

But right there he was out of line. If I need anything anonymous, it is Gamblers Anonymous. I'm not guaranteed to wipe my face where my behind may have been, I'm just taking a chance. Picking the part of towel for the face may not be rolling the die, but it's still gambling.

And because it is a form of gambling, it is not a black and white, ass to face, moral decision Dan would lead me to believe. If there is a chance I will dry myself as I had dried before, then I am not necessarily choosing to wipe my face in old butt-tracks. I am just playing the odds.

But the odds (and towel) get bad after two weeks. Real bad.

Dan clarified my discombobulated reasoning, in case I harbored any doubt about the fallacy of it all. "Ok, so the first time you say to yourself, 'Ass in the middle, face on the edges,' but after a few days you begin to wonder: 'Was it face in the middle and ass on the edges? Man it's freezing, standing here, dripping wet,' and plunge face first into the middle of the towel."

Dan then explained how he is the next evolution of the human species and people like me are simple minded peons caught in a web of habit and deceit and I could either get on the boat with him an Noah or stay on shore and drown with the rest of the stupid-ass creatures.

But would I give in? No way. Sure, Dan had a point. But washing every Sunday? That sounds like a lot of work. Besides, I'll be damned if I will concede, especially after the condescending lecture with fancy "logic" and sophisticated "reasoning." Instead, I choose to go on the offensive.

"You're a dick." I said, not in a complimentary way, but with obvious disdain for the male genitalia.

"Yeah, well at least I'm not wiping my face in my ass." He almost tagged on an "Ass face!" or "Ass Clown!" but his point was made and neither one of us wanted this debate to last any longer, well maybe he did, but hell, I'm telling the story so I get to tell what he was thinking, and in MY STORY he didn't want to talk about it any more..

Needless to say, I still use the same towel for at least eight days back to back. My towels thank me for it: they're still thick and healthy, even if they're a little dirty. Unbeknownst to Dan, however, I use towels with different textures on each side, carefully remembering that I dry my back with the course side, and my front with the soft side.

Or was it my face on the rough side and my posterior on the soft side? ("Face in the Rough, that isn't so tough..." or was it "Ass in the Rough, that isn't so tough.." "Beer before liquor you've never been...)

Oh no.

Well, I try not to let it bother me. When you're cold and wet, you really don't care. Besides, I bet my ass is pretty clean.

-KV

The Literary Brothel is Alive!

The Literary Brothel (www.literarybrothel.com) has finally gone down. This site is its replacement.

What is The Literary Brothel? Some call it a creative writing website started in 2001 by Parker Briggsmore and Klaus Varley. Parker and Klaus call it "a place to whore out the deepest and most intimate details of our lives in exchange for a little bit of internet fame." Others have used such language as "good for procrastination," or "not for me." All are correct.

Why did www.literarybrothel.com go down? The domain was lost due many complicated factors that cannot be easily summed up in one blog entry. That is, unless you say, "we were too cheap to renew it." Got 30 bucks a year? Neither do we. (Wait, did you say yes? Where were you??)

Anyway, this FREE site is where The Literary Brothel will been resurrected. Within the upcoming days, weeks, months, and (hopefully not) years, we will add the content that you so sorely miss from the old site, and perhaps even have "fresh" stuff as well.* By February of 2011, The Literary Brothel will appear in book form. If you are reading this, you are eligible for a free copy. No strings attached.**

So, welcome back, and stay tuned. We update every Tuesday and Thursday.

Seriously.

-Klaus Varley

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* Please send us your stuff so we don't have to write - literarybrothel@gmail.com - Thanks!

** Unless the book itself comes with strings, for some reason.