The Program: William – A short story.
A short story. People who know me are having a proper chuckle right now.
“Short story. Right, Kev. Uh-huh.”
No. Seriously. The reason for this mistrustful reaction is fair. My writing tends to be verbose, and that’s putting it mildly. What I consider a short story could very well be a full-blown novel.
Well, not this time, all y’all! This short story barely cracks 8000 words. So, yeah…apology accepted!
Here. Download it whilst I ramble.
As I occasionally do, I go through my documents folder looking for stuff I wrote decades ago. Most of it’s shit. Occasionally, I’ll find something I like. This story, “The Program: William,” was supposed to launch a series of short stories. I don’t recall why I didn’t publish this or follow through with more.
It breaks down like this: In 2008, I was part of a writer’s group that did monthly challenges. They’d offer a writing prompt as we were supposed to write a story under 10,000 words using the prompt as the first sentence. In this case, the prompt was: “Let’s do it again,” Jasmine said.”
I went with it, eventually crafting the story into something mysterious in which the unlikable protagonist learns a valuable lesson. Were I to do a back cover description, it might read something like this:
William Ramsey is a playboy. Women are disposable objects to him. One summer night at a popular bar in Westminster, Maryland, Will meets the mysterious Lawrence, who’s watched Will leave with an attractive woman only to return hours later for more. Lawrence asks Will about his philandering ways, posing a ‘what if,’ question, the most dangerous kind there is. What if Will could be a woman for a day to offer him a perspective he’d never considered? Will plays along, describing what he believes is the perfect woman. Lawrence abruptly leaves, telling him they’ll meet again…and soon, leaving Will to wonder what that conversation was all about. Blowing it off, he finds another woman, Jasmine Hall, and takes her home.
The next morning, Will awakens beside Jasmine, only he’s no longer Will Ramsey. He’s Lauren Ramsey.
The Program has begun.
What will happen to Will during his twenty-four-hour journey as a woman? Will he use the opportunity to explore a day in the life of the opposite sex with all the perks that come with it? Or will he use the experience to walk a mile in a woman’s shoes and what that realistically entails?
Interested? Here’s the link again. It’s free.
Obviously, I am not a woman. I had no idea what that would entail to tell the story accurately. I turned to someone I trusted, a woman with whom I’ve had a long and sordid history. I trusted her enough to ask the difficult questions about what it’s like to be a woman, especially as it applies to sexuality. Her insights were invaluable. Following the conversation and the many notes I’d taken, I wrote the final draft of the story and submitted it to the writer’s group.
It won second place. The notes were interesting, mostly from women who thought I got it all wrong. I wasn’t going to tell my source she wasn’t being a woman correctly. She might’ve had opposing viewpoints on that one.
Short stories are difficult for me. A friend of mine describes my writing as Shakespeare living in a John Patterson world. I consider that a compliment. People either write for profit or they write for themselves, and to hell with what other people think. I fall into the latter. I tried writing a formula three-act novel with a hero protagonist in an adventure/action situation. Like Jack Bauer from the old TV show “24” or Patterson’s Alex Cross series. I felt dirty. I felt like a whore, and the output wasn’t up to my standards. Plus, I can’t stop at the 70 to 80 thousand word mark. Verbose and all.
To quote the great Billy Shakes from Hamlet: “This above all: to thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man.”
There it is.
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