Welcome to the Wakefield Doctrine (the theory of clarks, scotts and rogers)
This is the Six Sentence Story bloghop.
It is hosted by zoe.
The way it works is this: there’s a different prompt word each week; using the week’s word, write a story that is six, (and only), six sentences in length.
Any style, genre, POV…whatever.
(Hey! thanks for the suggestion! Been getting a little worn-down (aka boring) in my writing of late. Nothing like an overly ambitious and beyond-my-current-skill-level-goal to kickstart things. After all, I am a clark. lol)
This week the word is:
CRANE
The engine of my high-mileage rental let out an old-man’s wheeze as I parked in the caliche parking lot of ‘The Adult Tree Motor Court’; under which ‘Just Far Enough Out of Scottsdale‘ was written in un-lit neon.
It’s said the key to effective marketing is knowing your clientele; if the empty spaces in front of the rooms at 10:00 am on a Thursday morning were any indication, passion and lust weren’t considered worth calling in sick.
Stepping through the door marked ‘OFFICE’ was like sticking your head into the frozen desert display case at the supermarket, my sinuses banged like the tenant with a broom handle one floor down; opposite the door was the registration desk; a congenitally-sullen man wearing a sweat-yellow cotton shirt and drugstore glasses around his neck, glared at me as I approached.
Behind him I could see into a dimly lit living room where an overweight woman in a flowered house coat sat, half-reclined on a grey-stained-into-dark-blue sofa watching ‘The Price is Right’ on a tv the size of a Jackson Pollock painting.
Putting my PI license on the counter, I said, “I’m investigating the murder of Robert Crane, were you here in 1978?”
The old guy picked up the ID, stared at it long enough to make me want to see if he was holding it upside-down, finally looked at me with the surprised but bitter expression of a high school bully on graduation day and said, “Who wants to know?”
About clarkscottroger
You’ve quite a descriptive writing style. I was so in that scene, at that hotel and eeww…”sweat-yellow cotton shirt “. Have to take a shower now, lol
you’re entirely welcome. speaking of showers, we all remember that master of the motel, Alfred.
Clark is always descriptive . Good six.
thanks Paul
Yeah, I saw and smelled that hotel office. So, good job being gross!
(in one of the not-final edits, I included an open bathroom door being visible… but am on a diet and totally want to write less words.)
lol
That would have been TMD; too much detail.
lol true
I agree with the others’ comments. This sounds like quite a grungy place to be.
That being said, you once again sent me to the dictionary to find the meaning of one of the words you used, and I googled to find out the size of the painting. I can count on learning something new when I read your posts.
I wish I’d thought of using crane as the name of someone. Maybe next time.
funny, I’m not an ‘art guy’ but the Jackson Pollock reference is from one of those memory fragments from school, the larger scale paintings and all.
We have that motel not far from here. Even driving past it gives me the shivers.
I always think, as I drive by such a place, how the heck do they stay in business?!
Nice! With the first sentence, I thought about how Kinsey Millhone always stayed in dumpy motels in Sue Grafton’s alphabet series, and lo and behold, you had a PI in your story, too! Cool!
thanks… yeah, got a project going to write a ‘first person detective story’… not surprisingly based on a Six Sentence Story I did a year or two back…
I did not see that coming! Great as always. I remember Bob Crane but was a kid when he died and knew nothing about his murder. Thanks for making me learn something.
I really like the show, but I was only in, like junior high or so… what was our culture thinking?!? a comedy about being in a prisoner of war camp..lol
Always have to wonder about places like this one. Nice vivid setting. I remember Bob Crane from Hogan’s Heroes. (A strange show in its own right.) Honestly can’t say I recall the murder, though.
yeah, same here. In my situation is wasn’t like, ‘hey did you see on the news Hogan got murdered!’ More like 20 years later, ‘hey you know who died a while ago?’
The show was about life in a prisoner of war camp. What’s not to laugh at about that?
lol
I had no idea he was murdered either but remember him from Hogan’s Heros which we used to watch . Your description, as always, puts us right in the scene. I particularly love the TV as big as a Jackson Pollack painting. Well done. I thought the last line was funny – I don’t know if you meant it to be but coming straight after staring at the card for an age I found it so.
thank you! I did, at least in my head, go for the humor of the time spent reading the card (with photo) and asking the question.
Wow, you’ve done a very vivid job of creating the mood and scene here, leaving me feeling like it’s someplace I really wouldn’t want to be… which is exactly right! Good job at taking a bit of history and adding your personal flair and flavor. I think you’ve served the situation well!
Thanks Josie! I really get a kick from writing a scene that will bring most every one to the same place.