the Wakefield Doctrine

Welcome to the Wakefield Doctrine (the theory of clarks, scotts and rogers)

This is  the Wakefield Doctrine’s contribution to the Six Sentence Story bloghop.

Denise is the host.

The prompt word:

BRANCH

In the realm of nightclubs and bars, the circadian rhythm that rules Man’s body, if not his mind, eschews the natural sunrise/sunset cycle in favor of ‘dark-enough’/’is-that-the-sun’?

At half-past responsible-adults-are-home-with-their-family, the house lights of the Six Sentence Café and Bistro flicker, the crowd, demonstrating the near-mystical coordination of micro-entrainment, reduces it’s collective susurrus and the tall, thin man, alone in the hallway at the far end of the bar, leans into the intermittent darkness and, harnessing the imbalance, walks out into the crowded room.

His path to the stage is a bit like slow-motion pinball; acknowledging the people at the many round-top tables, his trajectory a series of branches, created, and one might argue, defined, by the social landscape rather than the physical.

To maintain the arcade game metaphor, for surely you are already beset by mental images of chromium orbs, oddly conical stubs that ring with a mid-Twentieth Century carefree tone and, looking down, (with your mind’s eye), you see the paddles and feel the tendons tensing as they disappear into the palm; your world for the moment, a mixture of sound and light and the pre-human glory of The Chase.

“Ladies and Gentlemen,” shielding his eyes like a sailor on last watch as the edge of land breaks the hopeless curve of the ocean’s horizon,

“…and Lou,” a new voice joins the chorus of encouragement, a sound you might expect if crocodiles had night clubs and it was Comedy Night.

“Please join me in giving a warm, Café welcome, to some people you’ll believe you’ve always known, ‘Two Guys and a Girlie‘”.

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Welcome to the Wakefield Doctrine (the theory of clarks, scotts and rogers)

This is  the Wakefield Doctrine’s contribution to the Six Sentence Story bloghop.

Denise is the host.

You noticed the subtitle? ‘Part 2’? That means you still gots time to get off the crazy train. Sure, the first Six was a nice little piece with an interesting premise and a sneaky attempt at haiku. This post? That with the chocks kicked out. Part 2 (and Part 3) are Sixes for the fun of, as Phyllis likes to say, spending time with characters you enjoy.

You’ve been warned. lol

The prompt word:

BRANCH:

“Hold on, lemme handle this,” like an alternate-reality Ward Cleaver, after a weekend meth jag and some especially-exotic demands from his wife June, Lou Ceasare stepped to the front of the stationary conga line that ran from the entrance of the Six Sentence Café & Bistro, down the sidewalk past Sil’s Loans and Musical Instruments and tapered-off in the middle of the block where the Manchester Web Mill used to be; there were no objections, protests or resistance from anyone in the line.

“Look, buddy, I know you’re a temp brought in to work the door, but what you need to understand is that me and my friends,” addressing the man on the far-side of the velvet rope, Lou waved his cigar in the general direction of the two young women standing next to him, “Would like to enter the establishment early, so that we might say hello to the guy you’re replacing, before he goes on stage, capisce?”

Both of Lou’s companions acknowledged his statement: the woman on his right, Christian Louboutin stilettos, black mini-skirt (over a pair of torn Levis) and a leather motorcycle jacket, laughed and stared at the hapless doorman, while the woman on his left, all Dior and Channel, with a delicate tattoo gracing her décolletage like a convicted jaywalker sentenced to life on a technicality, straightened the lavender handkerchief in Lou’s sports-coat breast pocket.

Like a human tidal bore, the people already in the Café began to push back on the line when the crowd suddenly branched, like a seven-year-old Moses forced to take a show after a long day playing in the desert.

A woman, diminutive in height, but 6′ 8″ or 9″ in stature, stepped up the three granite steps; the two women at Lou’s side returned her smile with what, if one were very observant, were the slightest of curtseys.

“Language, Mr. Ceasare, if you please!”

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Welcome to the Wakefield Doctrine (the theory of clarks, scotts and rogers)

This is  the Wakefield Doctrine’s contribution to the Six Sentence Story bloghop.

Denise is the host.

(a three-part Six this week. can’t get ourselfs to put three into one post, so parts 2 and III will follow. no ego there, right? lol)

The prompt word:

BRANCH

“I’m tellin’ you guys, it’s the next exit, the one after where the baseball stadium used to be.”

Hope overflowing, 

The most vocal of the people in the car was neither the one behind the wheel, nor the one who rode shotgun; the source of more than a third of the energy and two-thirds of decibels (measured on the Vance-Annoyance Scale at a solid 8.3), was the person in the backseat.

a car speeds down the interstate,

The 1964 Chevy BelAir wagon, blue paint on the hood and roof prematurely rusty, like a well-intentioned man determined to overcome a flawed up-bringing, wove among the other participants in the linear demolition derby that was rush-hour in the capitol city; descending the branching exit ramp, the view went from 60 MPH fishbowls of stressed commuters to a full scale diorama: factory buildings of stone and brick, many long vacant were preserved like dinosaurs in a museum, held together with wire and cable, a single plaque in a sidewalk wall the only reminder of creatures that once ruled the Earth.

fear distills life’s promise.

“Hell, why don’t we hire a roadie or something, this equipment is pretty heavy,” with his back to the loading dock, the third passenger began to pull the equipment cases from the open tailgate, oblivious to the other two; the one who’d driven and the one who rode shotgun, stood and stared at the brick walls that transformed a simple, rude alley into a canyon. The connecting bridge between two buildings showing the passing of Ages in random boarded-up windows, the walls lichen’d with graffiti, vain memorials to love and hope; “Hey guys, we’re due to go on at 2:30, how about you give a brother a hand here?”

 

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Welcome to the Wakefield Doctrine (the theory of clarks, scotts and rogers)

This is the Doctrine’s Six Sentence Story for this week.

Denise is the host.

Prompt word:

STRUCTURE

“Ethan’s eyes are just fine, about as close to normal as we might expect for a seven-year-old boy, both in the structure and function of what arguably is the most critical of the senses,” Dr. Magliano smiled at the boy’s mother, holding the manila patient folder, as close to a Bible as wielded by any priest or minister in the throes of helping a young couple join into a life together or a pair of life-worn spouses needing assistance to cast loose the lines that bound one to the other.

The woman smiled down at the boy, the words neither negative nor alarming in content or tone; then, as if suddenly aware of her unguarded happiness, looked back at the ophthalmologist, raised an eyebrow but lowered her gaze, supplication prior to final benediction.

“He does, however, show signs of a slight astigmatism, just the beginning of a deviance in the receptors that filter out the abnormal parts of the spectrum.”

Ethan, being careful to stand at a point between the doctor and his mother, hedged his position by staring at the floor of the waiting room, confident in his ability to gauge the increasingly critical negotiations between the woman, (who with a casual movement touched the boy’s shoulder in a way reminiscent, if one were of such an inclination, of a drawbridge being raised), and the man who wore a spotless white coat in complete disregard of the fact of it being October.

“Nothing to worry about,” the smile on the eye doctor’s face was professional and, in the woman’s estimation, not entirely insincere, “With a pair of corrective lens, we can nip this in the bud and spare him the disability that comes with vision that is not limited to the statistical norm.”

Crossing the parking lot, Ethan scuffed leaves that had, with the non-lethal October breeze, begun to drift up against the curbstones and walkways, when he heard and saw two things: a shower of parchment-dry color, like butterscotch confetti mixed with fire engine red polygons raining down on his head and the happy laughter of his mother, “Yeah, like we’re gonna let them correct our view of the world;” he laughed in relief and she in defiance.

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Welcome to the Wakefield Doctrine (the theory of clarks, scotts and rogers)

This is the Wakefield Doctrine’s contribution to the Six Sentence Story bloghop.

Denise is the host.

Along with the first Six of this week, by way of some backstory, here read this: …previously at the Six Sentence Café & Bistro.

(We recommend you catch up with Mimi this week, or, (and it will make us feel so ‘way to be clever with the story interlinks!) clink on the first Mimi hyperlink as you read the Six below.)

This week’s prompt word:

FILM

“What the hell just happened?”

The rather juvenile and, surprisingly unsophisticated expression of surprise by the tall, thin man was as jarring as the disappearance of the Sophomore moments before as six of the Proprietors of the Six Sentence Café & Bistro looked on in varying degrees of astonishment.

Their individual commentary on the event was as characteristic, (if not idiosyncratic), as to be expected: the GateKeeper after drawing mightily on his Opus X, sent what could only be described as a, ‘smoke square’, out over the empty tables surrounding the bandstand, unlike it’s cousin, the smoke ring, it tumbled through the air rather than rotating; for his part, Ford executed a single rimshot on the snare drum, currently serving as a tray for his drink, (somehow) it possessed echo without reverb, a true koan of percussion; Jenne closed her book, (producing a sound more associated with a vacuum than a plosive); Chris signaled both concern and simpatico, and Denise said, ‘Huh‘.

Moving to the kitchen, the currently-acting manager, over-dressed for anything other than delivering a eulogy for a misunderstood head-of-state, straight-armed the swinging doors and stopped short, as the seventh Proprietor, at a lower than normal line-of-sight, was washing the floor with a decidedly 20th, if not 19th century, cleaning implement.

Knowing better than to express surprise, the tall, thin man crouched next to Mimi, noting with a smile the hint of a tiny convex rainbow on the bubbles in the wash-pail and, for reasons that partially hinted at his qualifications for his current position, remembered the stories his parents told of first seeing the contrast between Kansas and Oz in the 1940s film; maintaining a nearly-stable posture, he took a rag from the stainless steel countertop and began to dry the clean-water trail on the ceramic tile floor.

With a smile at once wise and a touch wicked, Mimi laughed, “Not a word about students and Masters or I’m Nobody will be all over us for multi-tasking a cool saying in a comment; leave the floors to me, you need to get the plot in something even slightly resembling a credible narrative arc.”

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