Part 30 - the end of a marathon and a decaying foot

Sea,

It was strange digging into my box of manuscripts and taking the second-to-the-last one out to read. It finally feels like we're going to make it. This rivals my first marathon in terms of the sense of accomplishment. Holy shit, I just saw a mouse and almost had a heart attack. That's the first mouse I've ever seen in my studio. I think he or she came out when I turned the radio off to write, thinking it was safe to come nibble on some tubes of Prussian blue paint. Because both my parents leaped onto furniture whenever they saw a mouse, I'm forever scarred...and scared. I've never been able to shake my fear. Seeing your brawny father nearly wet his pants at the sight of a helpless golf ball-size rodent will change a man, you know?

So Rowan is cowering in the putrid mushroom bed when her foot slips out from under her. Trying to free herself she digs into the muck and finds a badly decayed human foot. So that's macabre. This causes Rowan to scream, which gives her location away. Within seconds she's surrounded by flashlights. The thugs drag her, still retching, into a room where Cater is being held captive. He has welts on his head and cigarette burns up his arm. For such a stylized and generally inert buildup, the details of torture and death have been quite convincing. Maybe Ms. Lamb has a sadistic side that she needed to let loose.

Apparently the jellied body parts are Ah Sing's, the "laid-off" greenhouse employee. I'll say. I wonder if he qualifies for unemployment. They are Communists after all. He should at least get a state funeral. The group then conducts what played out in my head as a clichéd prisoner/captor exchange, where a pointed gun and an inexcusably long explanation of the crook's motive lasts just long enough for the captors to escape...Cater suddenly looked like harmonica-era Bruce Willis to me. Only, our captors haven't escaped...yet. Wow, though, the blood thirst of Lucy. She seems REALLY anti-social now. All the words wasted by Lamb on her inner-psyche are now out the window; she's turned from disturbed, complex, reluctant crime syndicate leader to Jeff Daumer. I think she might make a pate out of Sing's foot. I'm surprised she doesn't have cats; people that crazy HAVE to have cats. Anyway, as she's waxing sadistic with Rowan and Matt, she admits to shooting and killing Reshevksy...so that's official. Our first real loss so far. I kinda liked that guy.

In an attempt to extract information from Matt, Lucy approaches Rowan to start the torture session. It seems they don't actually believe Rowan knows anything, but are using the couple's mutual love as leverage. This actually redeems the story a bit, because there was really no good reason for the network to be hatin' on Rowan.

Just as Lucy is about to tee off on Rowan, my section ends. I don't know if it was seeing the mouse or reading the story, but my blood's flowing.

Tell me more, Cee.

Part 8 - mushrooms, Occidentals and the Brooklyn Botanical Garden

Caroline,

So sorry about the delay in getting part 8 to you. In my hasty departure for Los Angeles on Friday I accidentally took the wrong sections of the manuscript with me. I just got back this morning - took the red-eye and am barely here right now. I would wait until I am more alert to give you my next section, but I feel bad that I'm behind as it is.
LA was pleasurable. We went wine tasting in Paso Robles for a day, ate at some Jack-in-the-Boxes and drove around a lot...which seems to be what one does in Los Angeles.

"Oriental" is indeed a funny way to circumscribe a group of people; you never heard the term "Occidental" thrown around even when Oriental was in its prime. And it's strange how the modifier sticks in the case of non-human things but progresses in terms of people. It kind of demonstrates some of the politics involved the ethnic nomenclature. Groups are described by color, region, and direction (so strange). I think we should define groups by time instead of place, then we could only be bigoted toward people who aren't around anymore. Imagine being time-ist toward people born before 1920....I think ideas like that are why I should avoid throwing my hat in the social ethnography ring.

That's so funny about the poisonous plant plot point (say that five times fast), because a poisonous plant show just opened at the Brooklyn Botanical Garden. I'm going to see it this weekend and get acquainted with all those sinister Oleanders.
http://www.bbg.org/exp/wickedplants/amystewart.html

My section is actually fairly packed with plot details, though it seems that mine are lacking the non-typewritten traces of our author and editor. I'll bet you get a 37 year old jelly stain....or a fingernail...or a maybe even a booger. Wow, that'd be awesome!

My first paragraph contains the following line: "She pointed out with particular pride her large assortment of mushrooms, from the familiar Death Angel that had been the bane of my biology class in high-school, to more esoteric fungi." This confused me; I couldn't tell whether the class was 'shroomin and thus became overwhelmed by the subject matter; whether they were poisoned to death, and as a result failed biology, or whether the taxonomic complexity of this family of mushrooms had alone resulted in a poor academic performance.The beginning of my section is essentially a short trip through "poisonous botany 101." The exchange about deadly plants is then interrupted by two stocky workers approaching Kee and aunt Lucy, alerting them that someone tried to break into the storage room. The two men didn't see the person trying to break in, but did see a car drive away. Lucy then gets angry and directs Ah Sing to dock the pay of the watchmen for their lax effort.

Next, we get a wonderful tell-don't-show sentiment from Rowan as she remarks about coming to her aunt's home for peace and finding only tumult and tragedy. She then notes that the events did "bring her out of herself." So, the tone shifts; the stormclouds overhead recede and the sun shines bright yellow light on the farm, the Greenhouse and its poison crop.

The final cascade of events and conversation are fairly complex, with many suggestive passages. Aunt Lucy is painted in a kinder light, and Rowan admits to warming up to her a bit. James Kee snaps at Lucy because she desires to call the police about the two successive "incidents." He suddenly seems sinister. This seems to be a Scooby Doo-like device to take the focus off Lucy and to bring in another suspect as a focal point. Rowan muses before dinner that things on the farm were getting more pleasant and when they sit down to dinner Aunt Lucy suggests that Rowan should get around the city so she's not cooped-up all summer. This raises the eyebrow of Reshevsky (literally) and brings Rowan to recall the conversation they had by the harpsichord. Rowan responds that she never planned on staying the entire summer, to which Lucy says to leave the option open. The final few lines are odd, with Reshevky quizzically, and perhaps defensively, wondering how the police could think that the events of the previous night were anything but an accident. He then says that the police have no reason to ask any of them to remain in the city.

This last line was strange because I don't remember a precedent indicating that the authorities were going to prevent anyone from leaving. I'm wondering if this becomes a Murder-by-Death type of deal, where everyone's sequestered in an old mansion and they start dropping like flies.
Whew, that's a lot to think about. A plot as thick as frozen oatmeal.

tag, you're it.
-Shane