No more excuses - On Behalf of Kierstonian

Henry had been taught how to walk under almost any circumstance. In his youth, his governess had taught him how to walk like a prince. "Place your right foot directly in front of your left, chest UP, and your walking stick should gently brush the ground as your left foot touches the ground. When your left foot comes UP, your walking stick should swing about in a jaunty manner...JAUNTY, Henry, you're not trying to spear a boar..." These lessons usually included being whacked by his brothers' jaunty sticks more than Henry felt was rightly warranted. Francis' stick had a particularly nasty and frequent bite, as Henry recalled.

And if that wasn't bad enough, when Byron and Cedric were enrolled in The Academy, they were taught TWO different types of marching, which they enforced upon Henry  whenever they had time at home (which, luckily, was limited enough). The first type of marching was quite similar to Governess Walking, although it involved no cane for scum the likes of Henry. Lean back "AND STRUT"... Drive your heels "TO THE DECK"... Cover to the front "ALIGN TO THE RIGHT"... Henry never understood this last part- he was the only person his older brothers subjected to this torture, so there was nothing to his front or right except for the occasional tree. Only when his feet had blistered and the young manservants called them in to dress for supper was Henry allowed a brief reprieve. He remembered being so tired at one supper that he dozed off and awoke only when he felt his ear squish into his French beans. His father had graciously dismissed him to bed after this incident. And it was fortunate that he had done so, because the next morning Byron and Cedric deigned to teach him about "humps". This was by far the worst style of walking anyone could imagine. Henry was unsure to this day under what circumstances it could possibly be the most effective form of transportation. 

As he plodded along the dirt road leading from the castle into the forest, Henry recalled his first "hump". After a full day of marching around the interior garden, screaming random phrases about "cover" and "heels" and "strut", followed by a most undignified encounter with his French beans, the twins decided to punish Henry for his lack of discipline in bean consumption. The next morning (if you could call the deep blackness of the middle of the night "morning"),  Byron flipped his mattress over (with Henry still sleeping soundly in it) and Cedric poured a bucket of something that smelled and felt like a cold horse piss all over Henry's head. After recovering from the initial shock of nearly being smothered and drowned, Henry remembered a cacophony of clanging and yelling so loud that he was sure the entire castle would be alerted to his plight. As it happened, only the steward and two young kitchen maids were privy to Henry's torture, and they, out of necessity, kept quiet about it. What the young princes did upstairs was their own business, so long as the King and Queen didn't care to inquire about it.

After being forcibly dragged from his overturned bed by his hair, still dressed in his nightclothes and reeking of horse piss, Henry was saddled with a satchel full of what felt to be river stones, equal in weight to that of his body. Then dear Byron took off at a trot toward the low hills. Henry never would have kept pace, except that Cedric was behind him, catching his legs or shoulders or head with a horse whip whenever he began to lag too far behind. Henry was forced to jog to keep up with the long strides of his fully grown brothers (although he was verbally berated for jogging instead of increasing his stride length), and on they went up and down the low hills until Henry's knees buckled with exhaustion. 

So it was at quite a young age when Henry decided that he abhorred walking by any name. Yet here he was, walking with both a stick and a satchel to an undetermined location. Henry decided that he may as well plan to walk until he reached the edge of the earth, since he was as likely to find unicorns there as anywhere else.  And of course, if he were unable to find unicorns at the edge of the earth, he would have the option there to simply jump off. 

Walking always intensified Henry's melancholy to such criminal levels.  He felt quite fortunate indeed that he was able to walk for nearly three years without being overcome by his depressing lot in life. And in retrospect, he was grateful for his brothers' abuse, as he had been able to outrun several potentially murderous situations throughout his travels.

His abusive brothers and walking. Henry snorted and ran his hand over his black tangled mess of a beard as he realized how fitting it was that those were the only two thoughts in his head on his 21st birthday. His mind should be riddled with the problems of the realm, the difficulties of entertaining his wife's family on their impending visit to the country, and making preparations to tame his political rivals during the social festival season.  But it was because of his brothers that Henry was unable to attain a position that could challenge his mind in the slightest. It was because of his brothers that he was destined to a life of endless walking, with nothing to think about except walking and how his brothers were the cause of his misery.  He was both tired of walking and tired of thinking these thoughts, so Henry ordered another tankard from the plump pink bosom, despite his better judgment. Tonight of all nights, he needed the bitter black alcohol to wipe away his lack of memories.

When his tankard arrived, it was accompanied not by the plump pink bosom, but by a funny little man. He was using both of his hands to hold the tankard, but when Henry caught his eye, he lifted one hand and slammed the tankard to the table with surprising strength for a man barely larger than most children. 

He winked and said with a slight highland lilt, "Henry. I've been expecting ya for some time. What took ya so long?"

Henry stared at the funny man, trying to understand the deluge of thoughts churning through his head. There was no way his own mother would recognize him in this disheveled state, so how was it possible that a complete stranger knew him? His first instinct was to run. Immediately. But there was so much going on in his head that he couldn't seem to trigger his body to move. Instead, he put into words the one thought that was not drowning,

"I've been walking."

"I suspect ya have. And I bet ya still haven't walked to whatever ya think yer walking to."

Henry was not sure how much he appreciated the funny man's nonsense, given that he could barely make sense of his own nonsense. He tried-

"No. Because what I'm walking to doesn't exist, and what I think I'm walking to doesn't exist, so the only thing left to do seems to be to walk."

-and failed. He lowered his head and squeezed his eyes shut to try to slow his thoughts.

"Ach- ya couldn't be more wrong. If what yer walking to doesn't exist, and what ya think yer walking to doesn't exist, then I'd say it’s time to find a new destination."

Henry snapped his head back up and stared at the funny man's little face. For the first time in his life, his thoughts pointed in a specific direction.

"No more excuses, boy. I believe I have what you've been looking for."

The world's worst job

(For starters, my sincerest apologies about my....tardiness [may be the nicest way to put it]. Hope all is well in your respectives AORs)

Official Unicorn Caretaker. "Sweet, Dad" thought Henry. "Awesome 18th birthday present."
It wasn't that Henry didn't want some form of responsibility. After all, he was 18 and an adult now. But his mother wasn't so keen on him signing up to attend the kingdom's military academy, where he could at least hide his lack of puberty behind a uniform. Much less would she approve of him doing the stereotypical graduates' tour through the kingdom, meeting interesting people. More importantly, meeting interesting girls. No, not girls...women. For he was an adult now, and a man. A man with responsibility.
Or so Henry wanted people to believe. But people only really look at you as a man if you think you are a man, and Henry had some issues getting over what he saw in the mirror. The constant acne, complete lack of facial hair and scrawny muscles that not even the trainers' charms could improve did nothing for his self confidence.
And then there was the biggest pitfall of them all, the one obstacle in his way: He was the official caretaker of a grand total of ZERO unicorns.
It's hard to get people to take you seriously when your title is a joke (the king thought it was hilarious, as did all of Henry's brothers).
Henry wasn't going to let this deter him though, and he was damned if he was going to miss meeting some interesting....people. He was going to go looking for unicorns.
So he packed up his travel pack, convinced his best friend he wanted to go, charmed his mother into reluctantly agreeing to let him go without his usual entourage of 20, and started walking. Where to, he wasn't really sure. But walk he would until he had looked in every corner of the kingdom, or found the unicorns he was being held responsible for.

In which we meet Henry.

It sucked being the eighth son of a seventh son.

All it meant was that he had seven perfect older brothers, with perfect lives and perfect jobs, who ran the kingdom in perfect harmony.

Henry ran through the list in his head:

Alexander, the firstborn, had done his princely duty. He'd married his childhood sweetheart, the Lady Amelia, and they'd produced an heir and a spare within the year. The epitome of princeliness, Alex had been trained, since birth, to take over for their father and, by all indications, would be a benevolent and competent ruler.

Byron and Cedric, the twins, worked in perfect sync as the joint heads of the military. Byron was the head of the dragon air corps and Cedric dispensed weapons from the magical armoury, but they split all other duties evenly.

Damien, who'd dressed himself in black from the time he had a choice about clothing colour, handled the darker side of diplomatic relations. Henry tried not to think about what his brother coordinated from his rooms in the highest tower if he wanted to sleep well at night.

Edmund, the experimentor, had worked with the head of the Collegium Magica and developed a harvesting machine that practically ensured that the country would never go hungry again. And, he'd met Eileen, head of her class at the Sorceress Academy and Henry had fifteen silver coins on them being married by the end of the year.

After a wild youth, Francis had surprised everyone when he joined the priesthood. Oddly, he'd taken right to it and been given his first abbey at the age of 30, the youngest abbot in several decades.

And Gideon, the legendary seventh son. Gideon had done everything right. 'Slacked off', as tradition demanded, until he was kicked out to have his adventure.
And adventure he did. That dragon that terrorized the eastern border? Slain. The giant who lived in south? Driven away. And, of course, he'd completed three tasks to win the hand of the fair Princess Genevieve, marrying her and bringing peace and wealth to both their kingdoms.


But what about Henry? What was Henry's oh-so-exciting lot in life? What was left for him to do?
Nothing! Nothing princely needed doing, because his brothers had taken care of all that, and he was stuck with absolutely nothing to do.

He'd made the mistake of mentioning this to his mother...which is why he found himself with a new job.
A sucky job.
The worst job he could conceive of for an eighteen year old male.

His father had decreed it yesterday: Henry was the officially the kingdom's Unicorn Caretaker.

Girl in the jeans with the ridiculous walk...m4w

"Do you read Missed Connections?"

"I'm sorry?" Angie replied, unable to cogently decipher his question.

"Like on Craigslist?" The man was smallish and looked a little like Tom Cruise... only less... overtly insane. His eyes were blue, and although his complexion seemed to indicate he was a little older than Angie, his features were young and appealing. An awkward silence ensued as Angie still had no idea what the man was talking about and her expression clearly conveyed this. The man pulled out a dark smart phone and swiftly updated Angie's world. After he had shown her the extent of Craigslist, including the "Missed Connections" part of the Personals section, the awkward silence resumed. Angie had no idea what to do next - her years of self-pity, diet coke, and late night TV had poorly equipped her for randomly meeting an intriguing guy. Fortunately (fortunately, that is, for the moment; unfortunately for both Angie and the man) he was equally awkward.

"Well... nice to meet you?" He said, glancing away as an involuntary grin slashed his face.

"Who were you trying to meet? If you don't mind me asking." Angie's awkwardness paid off as she stammered out exactly what she wanted to ask. Her directness caught him immediately off guard.

"Who is your Missed Connection?"

The Strange Stranger

“Uhhhhh…. I’m trying to see what this display looks like from different angles. See that dress, it looks completely different from over here.”
“Oh, I thought you might have been here to meet me…I mean you weren’t told to be here at this time or day?”
“No, just checking out this display. I’m actually here because this store has been getting some complaints about its display. Can’t you see how awful it is? Something really needs to be done. It’s all about how it looks as you walk by and when you are this end it has no draw for a customer.”
“I’ve never really thought about it that much. Well, sorry to interrupt. Good luck with fixing this display.”
Angie continued to pace back in front of the display, appearing to scrutinize the mannequins until one of the employees came out and asked if she was interested in one of the dresses on display. Angie quickly lied and said no thank you and proceeded to walk lightly, sexily, away.
Once she was out of the mall however, she began to stomp to the rhythm of “Why-Am- I-So-Stupid?!” oblivious to the stares of other mall goers trying to steer clear of her path. Angie was so intent on her stomping rhythm that she ran into that person who had witnessed her pacing in front of the display window. She was so startled to be taken out of her rhythm that she was not expecting the next question that was asked.

In which Angie makes a resolution

As she overanalysed the way she walked, Angie made a decision. No, a New Year's Resolution, albeit a few days early.

'It's never too early to start on those, right?' she thought to herself. 'Plus, if I start now, maybe I'll actually keep to it in the new year. No one ever keeps their actual New Year's resolutions; maybe a pre-New Year's resolution will be more successful.'

She frowned a little as she concentrated on every step she took.

"Less foot slapping, Angie. Let's start there," she muttered to herself. Then, realising she'd said that out loud, and that talking to herself probably wasn't the way to entice people to spend time with her, she decided to--no, resolved-- to make sure that she didn't accidentally let any more decisive phrases slip out.

She knew that she thought about things too much, and never actually did anything. Last night, channel-surfing and chugging diet soda, all she'd done was analyse and reanalyse everything that she didn't have in her life. What was the point of that?

She was walking straighter now. She still swayed more than most people would, but she focused on turning it into a sexy strut rather than the flat-footed, drunken swagger it usually appeared to be. Her self-improvement plan was starting already.

Angie was cognizant of what her life lacked: excitement, love...anything of interest, really. And, she knew why. It was her! If she wasn't interesting, how could she expect her life to be interesting?

Her thoughts came back to Andy Bumpass. Sure, he was fictional, but his life was interesting. And why? Because he was interesting! That fictional mall cop had more depth and character in one episode than she'd been able to muster in years.

She paced back and forth in front of the large Bloomingdale's windows several times, watching herself closely and making small adjustments to her posture with every lap. She'd mastered the soft footfall -no more noisy slapping feet for her- and the sexy strut independently; now she just had to be able to do both together.

"What are you doing?"

Cannibalism. From a previous writing exercise.

(From the writing exercise book What If? Writing Exercises for Fiction Writers by Bernays/Painter.  Exercise entitled "Beginning a Story with a 'Given' First Line."  The exercise: "Where were you last night?")

Angie read the sign advertising CBS's latest bombshell docudramedy.  The show followed Andy Bumpass a real-life mall cop following his childhood dream by moonlighting as a carpet-cleaning agency dispatcher.  Each episode revealed new complexities to Andy's edgy lifestyle until he arrived home to answer his wife's tagline question "Where were you last night?"  Andy always had trouble trying to convincingly recreate the night's events for his wife.  Hilarity ensued as the audience endured Andy's imagined flashbacks.  Angie hated that she knew this.

WHERE WERE YOU LAST NIGHT?  The yellow block letters on the poster cleverly condemned the passers-by for not watching Andy's latest adventure and it was working.

Angie read the sign and when she read it she felt guilty because she was reminded that she had wasted another night last night and that instead of being with people or trying to be with people or trying to be with someone in particular she had instead spent the night alone, again, on her couch that smelled like mustard consuming an entire keg of cheese puffs and watching a series of pathetic primetime network attempts to encapsulate life as it is in one hour unfortunately including the aforementioned CBS docudramedy.

As she trundled down the crowded city street alone Angie briefly thought about what a waste her life was just like her last night but mostly she thought about how when she walked she swayed side to side and slapped her feet more pronouncedly than most people and that was probably why no one would spend time with her.