Jim Harkness

In Which we meet our protagonist....

Jim Harkness sat at his desk and stared at his monitor. he stared and stared and nothing happened. Not a damned thing. Rain drizzled along his window as he stared, the loud cooling fan from his work computer whirred noisily just below him, and still he stared. He typed nothing, didn't move, didn't blink....he just stared. Ordinarily someone would have noticed by now and said something to him, but it was a Friday and business was slow. Rain tended to do that. Plus it was just cold enough outside that anyone out in it was probably on offical business and not too keen to stop in and talk to a reporter. No, if there was a story to be had out there in any of that muck, he would have to go get it himself.

Instead he stared. He stared at his blank screeen without moving or typing and just barely breathing. And he was loving every minute of it. For the first time in nearly a month he had time to just sit for a moment and take in the sounds around him. It was something he liked to do at any new job and yet this one hadn't afforded him the time to do so until this particular Friday. Something about this day made this awesome. He woke up feeling it, woke up feeling a change in the air, like on those rare good days when you wake up early and are instantly awake and feel so good you don't even need coffee. And he didn't. He hadn't drank any all day. He just excitedly left his apartment and headed to work, sat down at his computer and pulled up a few files. The office floor was essentially his--well his and another assoicate working across the floor-- and he finished his work in no time. Now he was tasked with putting together something new and it was far more tasking than it was really worth. It was a puff piece really, something that the paper churned out during the slow winter months in order to keep people reading. It wasn't particularly insightful or informative; it wasn't gritty or gripping. It was a simple thing to make people feel good and to escape the bitter cold of the weather around them. Jim hated writing it. He hated writing it and yet every year he got stuck doing it. For the past seven years he had this assignment, and for the past two he delighted in finding ways to sneak certain morose messages or colloquialisms into the prose and laugh with derision when the chief missed them. Ususally. Usually he delighted in that. But not this time, not this year. This year he simply didn't have it in him. He sat and stared and watched that little line blink incessantly insisting on his input. He would give it none. This was protest, pure and simple. As he watched it his ire rose, his indignation flaring inside him an his heart beating in resounding support of his decision.

Casually he fingered the large tome on his desk, a collection of tales and works by Edgar Allan Poe, and as he stared at that blank screen he moved further and further away from the task at hand and in his mind dove into the myriad tales of sorrow, woe, and the macabre that made Poe famous. He was an astute fan of Poe, often wishing for just a tenth of his literary gravitas. His fascination with Poe drove him to write, to pursue it as a profession. He hadn't however, wanted to be a journalist. He wanted to weave the tales that brought people to their knees in terror and sorrow, to envoke the powerful emotions of woe and scorn and dejection that so plagued so many of the characters in Poe's work. Like people he wanted to craft together stories and characters that were intrinsically maligned to societal norms and yet still invoke sincerity and earnestness so you couldn't help but identify with them.

But a man has to eat. Has to put food on the table. Though single, Jim Harkness very much wanted a family, and knew that being the top journalist for the third highest ranking paper in the tri state area was a great position. It afforded him a certain luxury and noteriety that kept him comfortable. Besides, this way he could write at home in his leisure and produce his novel and then hang up his journalism credentials forever.

That is what he told himself ten years ago when he first got hired. He would write on the side, write at home, finish the novel in two years and be famous. But ten years later and several holiday messages under his belt, and he was no closer to finishing that novel now than he had been then. It was a bitter spot on his soul, and as he now sat in front of that blank screen he again couldn't help but feel that bitterness feed into his anger.

But he did write. Maybe not stuff good enough to be a novel, but there were plenty of poems and short stories scattered about his apartment that showed his prolific attempts. But nothing really seemed to stick with him, nothing that held his attention long enough to really get excited about it and keep it going. He would try, work up story boards and outlines and have grand plans....but eventually the idea became a bit tired to him and something else inevitably caught his eye or got in the way.

Sounds like my dating track, he thought sarcastically as he continued to do nothing. True, he had gone on many dates in the past few months, but nothing seemed to stick there either. Ever since his breakup nearly a year ago he just hadn't been interested in anyone. He dated because he was told to, because others said he should. But he really wasn't interested. It wasn't that he missed his ex: he knew deep down that he didn't. For the most part he simply felt done with the entire hassel. But, no matter how many times he told his friends and family that they still pushed him to get out. At least now, when he was at work in his office and staring at his blank screen, no one would bother him.

There was a knock on his door. He sighed. Almost no one. If there was one thing he could count on with absolute assuredness it was that there would be a knock on his door every day at precisely 5:45pm. Sometimes it was soft, like a child checking to see if anyone was home. Other times it was excited and insistent, just a touch too jovial to be anything other than annoying. His door would then fly open (regardless of the type of knock) and there before him would stand this short, waifish blond woman with bright blue eyes and a smile that was anything but sincere. Her entire demeanor spoke of nefarious dealinigs, and the gossip about her around the office certainly made her a person to be watched. She was a hunter, a woman interested in bedding every man she laid eyes on and making sure everyone knew about it. Ruthlessness and shear persistence seemed to be her weapons of choice for many of her victims, and now it seemed she had her eyes on Jim.

"Ready to knock off for the day? I have a spot all picked out for us at my favorite little bar. It isn't too far from here! We can walk and be there in five minutes. Come with me..." She held out her had expectantly, and again the image of a child cropped into his mind.

"In case you haven't noticed, it is raining Trudy," He said with a sigh and motioned to the window. The rain had in fact picked up, going from a drizzle to an out right down pour. A crack of thunder only served to signify how harsh the storm had become.

"I am going home and getting into bed. I had a late night last night...friends keeping me up." It was a half truth. Yes a friend had called and relayed some very bad news to him, but that conversation had only lasted ten minutes. What kept him up was the grisly images of his entire family, their bodies torn apart by what had to be a wild beast, all around his beloved Aunt who had died moments earlier. He had stayed up until four in the morning looking at the images on his computer, horror stricken and yet also fascinated by them. Jim wasn't even sure when he went to bed....He just remembered showering and coming to work. Maybe that was the true reason writing the uplifting seasonal message struck so raw with him this year. His entire family was dead, gone in a matter of moments in what had to be the strangest of circumstances ever. Even now it sent chills through him.

"Come on Jim, you never go out with me. I am beginning to think that you don't like me," Trudy replied with mock hurt in her voice.

She's catching on, he thought with a smile. Turning to look at her again he shook his head playfully. "I am just really tired. Rain check?" Jim chuckled. The rain....it was a literal rain check for once. With a protracted sigh Trudy departed his door, and once again left him to his blank screen. Jim slumped in his chair, glad the confrontation was over. Trudy could make his life a living hell if he let her. And he was determined not to. He would just have to find more creative ways to defer in the future. Mother Nature would only help him for so long.

"Screw this," he said aloud before switching off his monitor and heading out of the office. He could do the stupid message from there, email it in. He had already decided he wasn't coming into the office tomorrow. One of the beauties of being a journalist and one of his caliber was that he could do that. And that way he could avoid Trudy for yet another day. He smiled. Plans already coming together. Grabbing his hat and coat he buttoned up and made a mad dash from the office to his truck and headed home.

Home was a spacious condo on the Northern outskirts of the city in which he worked. Home was a place rarely seen by anyone who wasn't family. Each and every aspect of its decor Jim had painstakingly picked out. His overal color scheme was blue, running the gamut of shades, vibrancies, and densities throughout his home. He loved art and had relished the opportunity to pick out everything. And though many weren't suited to his schemes he didn't care: it was for him not them.

As he walked through the door he immediately grabbed his remote to his music player and switched it on. "I am in the mood for something French," Jim said and with the push of a button the powerful voice of Edith Piaf filled his condo. He tossed his coat onto the back of a chair and headed into the kitchen. Glass down, whiskey out, he had a drink in his hand and was reclining on his couch in just a few minutes. It was a routine, a ritual he established shortly after moving into the place and he kept it all these years. It was almost the only way he could relax. Did it make him an alcoholic? He didn't care. All he cared about was at least having an opportunity to relax....even if it only lasted to the bottom of his glass.

"Take care to enjoy that drink," A somber voice said from behind him. "It may very well be your last." Jim jumped up, glass falling to the ground and shattering on the hardwood floor.

Author's Note

CONSTRUCTIVE criticism is always welcome.