Welcome to the Wakefield Doctrine (the theory of clarks, scotts and rogers)
This is the Doctrine’s weakly contribution to the Six Sentence Story bloghop.
Hosted by Denise, subject to the Rule of Six.
Prompt Word:
CARD
“The first guests of our April Fool’s Day3 will be arriving before we know it, time to get to work setting up,” the tall, thin man, after rolling up his impeccably-tailored sleeves, put down the rack of glasses and held his suit coat out, over the bar, “Do you mind putting this on a chair somewhere?”
Perfectly shaped eyebrows shifted like hungry wolves looking for the prey’s weakness as Rosetta Storme stared in disbelief; finally her shoulders relaxed slightly, but sufficiently, to bring her upper body from attention to at ease.
Like olden day card sharps looking for the single weakness in their opponent, the young woman and the refined gentleman began an exchange:
“No problem, what the hell, I’ll go put it in your office,” and took one step in the direction of the hallway…
“Stop, under no circumstances are you to ever go down the hallway without being accompanied by a Proprietor…”
“Jeez… just trying to, like, get in the spirit, but if you people are so uptight, maybe I should just leave…”
“Not at all, it’s for your… I promised Lou that you would be safe working here,”
“Hey, old dude, I ain’t no kid, I can take care of myself and am way capable of handling drunks both male and female…”
“You misunderstand me, this is not about the customers, hell, it’s not even about the Manager’s office,… it’s about the hallway…”
“Are you busting my balls or what?”
Sighing, the Proprietor continued, “You’ve worked here, what, a total of five days, and among other attributes, you are very observant…”
“Sure but whats that got to do with…”
“Don’t interrupt, just tell me if you’ve seen a single thing about this place, lights, plumbing fixtures, furniture that seems to be broken or in need of repair…wait, don’t answer… the hallway at the end of the bar, tell me, what you see?”
“The lights are fucked up, a bulb or two that’re ready to burn out, … a little dark for a emergency exit route…it’s been badly lit since I got to this zoo, so the hell what…”
“Do you think Mimi, a Proprietor and one of the, to use an expression from before your time. the most-together people in this… zoo, as you so charitably put it, sits there at the last seat, right next to the service station because it’s the best seat in the house?
“She’s there so you or some other kid, being all young and oh-so-sure of yourself does not come to harm.”
About clarkscottroger
Very magical, thank you.
Very Twilight Zone-ey.
Imagine a Café…
Hey! Thanks for the set up. I trust you and Nick will stop by the SSC&B sometime next week (or the week afta)…
…stepping through the glass-and-stainless steel foyer (after lowering his handcart down the three granite steps from the sidewalk) the delivering, butt-holding the inner door as he pivoted in… the delivery person looked about the space… to his left, past the host stations he could see that the interior designer had made best use of the early 1900s mill building’s architecture as along the exterior wall, where the buttresses created a series of indentations (the rough-hewn rafters above needed support only intermittently) which contained single tables (and three chairs) all of which were afforded visual (if not acoustic privacy by near-gossamer curtains hung semi-circularisticly from the wide-board wooden ceiling); the remainder of the space was filled with round-wood tables and spindle-back chairs. Opposite the exeterior granite block wall was single brick wall that put the square(ish) in the rectangle room., it was divided in the middle of it’s run by a low stage. Walking forward to the bar that ran down the right-hand wall where they now stood, clipboard in hand, called out: Delivery for a Mr. or Mrs. or Miz or Whatever …. Proprietor!! I have three boxes of Narrative Extenders, Plot Twists and one envelop marked ‘Surprise Endings’.
Who gonna sign for this?”
This mental-mapping always confuses me. Perhaps one day you’ll draw up a map on a restaurant napkin (aka serviette).
lets meet half way:
Exterior any of a million granite-walled mill buildings. Five or so stories. Three granite steps down from the sidewalk an red-painted oak door.
For the interior POV looking down from a height sufficient to see the entire floor plan.
a rectangle
then entrance is at the lower right corner (from above) the long sides correspond to the sidewalk outside.
(once through the vestibule)
the bar runs from just inside the door to the far side of our rectangle (noteL this is the shortest of the four dimensions) to the hallway that leads to the manager’s office
to the left is the balance of the rectangular floor plan. mostly tables and chairs.
there is a small stage at the mid-point of the interior ‘side’ wall (the other of the two longer parallel sides)
halfway along the bar is the entrance interrupting the typical bar’s shelves of liquor bottles to the kitchen
I would say something to the effect that I avoid the graphic depiction because I am better at… lol and let’s leave it at that
your buddy Nick? Like any Proprietor he can be found pretty much any/everywhere his domain-of-choice as GateKeeper is somewhere in judicial distance of the entrance (depending on weather)
I just heard my visuospatial processors click. Excellent. Thank you.
np
Dang straight. It takes a heap o’ prayin’, too.
ikr?
That hallway now seems spooky to me.
as well it should
No way, hallway!
surely one of the most potent of images/architectural elements… next to fricken cellars stairs gotta give ’em Respect
You’ve got the 411 now on the hallway, Keith, ya know, when you’re lookin’ for the men’s room on Thursday night.
Be sure to hit the bar first – Denise’ll start a tab for you asap. Hell, don’t be surprised if she asks you to guest co-bartend with her for a bit….. Yessss!
There is nothing wrong about that place, particularly in that Manager’s office. Just wondering whether that picture is still there?
yeah, agree. the Manager’s office is a total oasis*
* but when we think about it, what makes an oasis so welcome? killing-endless sand and desert or shark-infested waters.
Probably, Chris. Who in their right might would venture to remove it, lol
It only took me till today to realize Mimi is MIMI- omg- And Clark, do I denote a predication for caging wild beasts in this week’s entries? ie; references to zoo’s in both posts…..
yeah…wait!! what?!?!
(lemme go look…)
whew!!! wasn’t sure which I posted first*
what a fun question?
err… why a zoo reference…
As to how the Ian Devereaux installment came together, I think the idea of zoo popped in my head first, then the (fun of looking up words) and finally how to present the most extreme examples of a zoo.. ’cause, you know, high school.
the Scorpions tune, that was just from a place where the true fun lies (sometimes hidden, other times streetwalker-loud on a Monday city-night) and…and! It was one of those more satisfying (after interminable frustration).. a sense of a song I liked, maybe a fragment of guitar… then the tone and finally the word/Title) damn that part is fun.
talk about your Family Circus diagram (I will leave the udated, sure, a little risque and way profance updating of the stops Billy (or Dolly or Jeffy or the un-named infant)… god! you know the old saying (that I didn’t write: ‘Those the gods would destroy, they first make mad.’ … in aging there is a much more real curse of the deity or deities… those who survive but are not sufficiently repentant, random memories grow and persist like GMO weeds’**)
*of course, given our approach to writing, the publish date is not the most definitive in time approach to lineage
** ok doesn’t really roll off the tongue, but a little polish maybe?
Fun and engaging scene, Clark. I can confidently say, for me, Rosetta has become as real as Lou.
I suppose the best we can do is cross our fingers Rosetta is on her best behavior (yeah, as if – wait! that’s the Bartender talking!)