Thursday, September 2, 2010

Argument

Wrote this to work on speech patterns. Not sure where this came from idea was, maybe Steve smacked me again. Hope you enjoy.



“There's no way in hell my son is leaving this house looking like that!” Herbert yelled.

“Honey, it’s just a phase, he’ll grow out of it, besides…” Gretchen was trying to be the calm rational one, but Herbert, her husband, interrupted, a volcano already overflowing.

“A phase my ass, when I was his age…”

“You had an earring, and I’m sure your father had this exact same argument with Helen,” Gretchen said, referring to Herbert’s mother. “Besides, what’s the harm, it‘ll grow back eventually.”

“Well he can forget about a social life.” Herbert raised his voice even louder, the windows rattling. “You hear me boy, you're grounded until it grows back. I’ll find some excuse to tell your teachers. You can come down to eat, but not until I’m finished, I don’t even want to look at you.” Herbert emphasized this with a growl.

“Now, now Herbert. Calm down. Be reasonable.”

“Reasonable? You don’t think I’m being reasonable?  I want to go up there and rip his head of his shoulders. Seriously, this is calm,” he yelled back at his wife.

“Honey, do you want to replace the windows again?”

Herbert shook his head.

“Then lower your voice a little, please. Remember your blood pressure. Doc Robinson told you to take it easy this week, didn’t he?”

“Yes dear,” Herbert mumbled.

“That’s better, now when you got that earring, what did your dad do about it?”

“I was grounded for a year, and he ripped it out of my ear.”

Not the answer Gretchen had been looking for. She had thought Helen had better control over her husband all those years ago. “And honestly, what do you think Joseph’s punishment needs to be.”

Herbert looked to have realized he was over reacting, until he remembered what
Joseph had done. “Boy, get your ass down here!” He was shouting again.

Joseph came down the stairs, a baseball cap hanging lopsidedly on his head.

Gretchen smirked at this, but it only further pissed off Herbert.

“Didn’t think this too far through, did you?” Herbert yelled in his sons face.

“But dad, it'll grow back.”

“That’s not the point.” Honestly, Herbert did not know what the point really was, other than he did not like it, but he was not going to tell Joseph that.

“Then what IS the point dad? It’s just an ear. It WILL grow back, it'll take about a week.  I know, but what's the point of being a troll if I can’t express myself by cutting off extremities?”

3 comments:

J. A. Platt said...

Oh, that is awesome. I love that Herbert knows he's being irrational and can't help himself. This was about my dad's reaction to finding out my sister was thinking of a tattoo (thank god I got mine without telling him!).

Two little edits: Seriously, you think this is not calm? This seems a little stilted (considering the very natural flow of the rest), it could be cut to 'This is calm.'

And this is a weird turn of phrase: Didn’t think this too far through obviously, did you? Obviously could be cut or moved to the beginning of the sentence.

Now I'm going to have a horrifying dream about what my friends in college would have cut off if humans could grow extremities back. ;)

Jonathan Martin said...

I see what you are saying about both of those. Thanks for the feedback and I have made the adjustments.

alphabete said...

Wow, cutting off an ear. Crazy thing is, if teenagers could do that they WOULD! Or any other extremity. I didn't see it before the edits JA suggested but I like it after them, and I'm going to be thanking my stars when my little one just wants a nose ring!

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