Okay, folks, normally Norman Spinrad and I don’t tend to see things the same. For my tastes, he complains a little too much, and I’m sure he doesn’t like me for varied reasons personal to him. But his current blog post is a very clear take on what many writers have been talking about with traditional publishing. Norman is calling it a death spiral, ordering to net, whatever.

He is spot on the money, and in his comments, he also addresses why he won’t just change names as many writers do and keep going. Pride, of course, a long career of course, but also overseas publishers in his current home country of France.

Note, he’s 70 and not writing under pen names, I’m 60 and writing under a bunch of pen names and doing just fine, not counting moving quickly to electronic publishing. We are two very, very different long-term professional writers. Keep that in mind.

Older experienced writers going into New York have it much, much harder after being around for a time, something we are talking about in comments on the last cows post. That’s a hard concept for many to realize and a topic of an upcoming Sacred Cows chapter. Norman talks some about this from the publishing side. Worth the read right here.

FREE FICTION

Each week, as I said last week, I will put up a new short story to read for free. The start of the story is below, with a link to Dean’s Stories web site. The entire story is there and last week’s story as well.

I will leave up two stories to read for free at a time. So make sure you come back regularly. This week a short young adult story about a ghost who wants to grow up.

Growing Pains of the Dead

Growing up is a universal desire of all kids, even those who died at the age of fourteen. Set in the primitive area of Idaho, this gentle ghost story tells of a young boy named Mathew who finally gets a chance to grow up one hundred years after he died.

Available in all electronic formats on Smashwords, Kindle, and Scribd.

Published by WMG Publishing.

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# # #

GROWING PAINS
OF THE DEAD

Dean Wesley Smith

In the towering mountains of central Idaho storms sweep in almost without notice, sometimes dumping snow measured in feet in a matter of hours. In the summer the heat can kill a human without water within days, and the steep slopes can trap even the most experienced hiker in a confusing mix of valleys filled with giant trees, thick brush, and fields of fallen rock. The area is now designated “primitive area” mostly because it is just too rugged to bother doing anything else with.

There are no towns.

There aren’t even roads.

We live in a valley called Monumental Valley in this primitive area, off a creek called Mule Creek. From mid-September to late May, for humans there is no way through the deep snow in or out of the valley. Even in the summer only a small trail leads over the summit and to small human settlements in valleys beyond the steep ridges. I understand there are huge human cities beyond those valleys, but I can not imagine them.

Going downstream in the Monumental Valley, the trail follows Mule Creek until it blends into a river called “The River of No Return.” The trail ends there.

We have a very simple existence here, in our steep-walled valley. Once in a while a few humans visit, usually carrying too much weight in fancy colored backpacks.

I like it when the humans came into the valley. They are always fun to watch, even though they never know I am there. A thousand years before my time, the first humans had come into the valley and stayed for a time. Then just over a hundred years ago my family settled here, to mine for gold, my father said.

A huge flood wiped out where we were living and the town we lived in, and the remaining humans just eventually all left the valley, leaving us to ourselves, wondering through the trees, waiting for something. Something none of us knew or talked about or even worried about. We do not worry about anything.

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To read all of this week’s free story, go to Dean’s Stories.

I thought for this chapter I’d talk about myths in general, why they are so strong, why they are often designed to stop writers. And give a study plan to help past some of them.

So far I have done 26 chapters in this book for a total word count of around 80,000 words, with each chapter focused on one area. It’s been great fun, even with the angry letters. And numbers of people have told me that I have helped them again find the fun and joy in writing. That’s fantastic. Thanks!

I really had no agenda when I started this series eleven months ago. I was just angry at the stupidity of the myths and how young professionals coming into this business had no second opinion or logical business voice. So that’s what I tried to be, a second opinion, even in my angry chapters.

To start off, let me give you a summary of what has already been done in this book. Suggestions for future chapters are welcome please. The finished ones are listed in the order I wrote them in.

Just click on the links to go right to the chapter if you would like to read them again. And make sure you read all the comments. Great discussions in the comments.

In fact, I want to take this moment once again to thank everyone for the great comments and Laura Resnick for her fantastic perspective and clear comments. If you haven’t read some of the topics and discussions below, feel free to comment on them after this post. Or after the post itself.

KILLING THE SACRED COWS OF PUBLISHING

(The chapters so far as of July 27, 2010)

—Speed.

—Rewriting

—Agents Sell Books

—Workshops

—Self-Promotion

—Book as Event

—Writing is Hard

—No Money in Writing Fiction

—Agents Know Markets

—Agent Agreements

—Agents Care About Writers First

—Agents Can Give Career Advice

—You Don’t Need to Keep Learning

—Agents and Your Money

—Your Agent Sells Your Book Overseas

—Follow the Rules to Get Published

—Writers Don’t Need to Practice

—Researching Fiction

—Asking Your Agent Permission

—Rejections

—Only 300 Writers Make a Living

—Talent is a Myth

—Agent and Contracts

—Only One Way

—The Agent 15% Myth

—Agents need to Take Care of Writers

Okay, that’s a bunch of reading. Now on to the topic at hand.

THE POWER OF THE MYTH

Over this last year I have gotten my share of angry letters from new writers telling me how I don’t understand them. I talked about that a few chapters back. And among other angry letters, I got one attack publicly from an editor too afraid to show her face. If a person isn’t willing to stand openly behind their opinions, they sure aren’t worth much in my view. Both the opinion and the person. I have very little respect for fear and cowardice as you can tell.

So why did the chapters of this book stir up so much discussion? Let me see if I can name a few surface reasons.

1) I am going against what just about everyone else is saying. What you hear at writer’s conventions, and from both editors and agents is often exactly opposite of what I am saying. But if this was the only reason, I would be ignored, not attacked.

2) My opinions are based in real business thinking. Combine that with the first reason and my chapters start that faint “feeling of worry” in writer’s minds that maybe, just maybe, I might be right in some places. How dare I question belief systems, but that nagging worry that I might be right makes them mad.

I’ve started or worked in many businesses and been trained in both architecture and law. I even owned my own publishing company for seven years. I love business and the publishing business. So many things I kept hearing as I came in made no sense to me. Now thirty years later they make even less sense. So all the chapters above are based in one way or another in logical business sense. Thus I am telling people that stupidity exists in the business they want to work in. That also makes people angry in defense.

3) Writers as a group want someone to take care of them. We feel we are powerless alone and thus when we come in we must be taken care of. But every one of my chapters in this project push the fact that writers must take responsibility for their own careers.

That’s scary, especially to the generation that came up in the 1980s and 1990s who were trained that they deserved everything they wanted. The “Entitlement Generation” as some have called it. My generation raised that generation, so it’s my generation’s fault I’m afraid. Of course now with this big crash, that “Entitlement Generation” is learning that maybe, just maybe, they aren’t entitled to everything they want and have to work harder than they wanted to get the basics.

We have a long ways to go as a culture to get out of this entitlement mindset. And when I tell a writer they really shouldn’t allow anyone to take care of them, but to learn their business and do it themselves, they get angry at me. It is just not how they were raised.

4) Anger comes from money discussions. In the generation of some of the biggest money scams in history, writers get angry at me when I tell them two things: First, never let anyone touch your money before you do. Second, you can make a living writing fiction. Both seem so logical when looked at common sense business practice and the facts of the money in this business, yet all the chapters I did on those topics got me the most angry letters.

THE REAL REASON THE MYTHS ARE SO POWERFUL

Besides the four major areas above, there is one very large human nature element that causes the myths of publishing to get to even sane people: We all want order.

And we are all trained to expect it. Every one of us, from moment one.

Kristine Kathryn Rusch has a wonderful analogy of how writers should act when writing. She says we need to revert back to our two-year-old selves. No rules, just pure joy and exploring. But when we were two, our parents kept putting rules on us. Don’t scream in restaurants, don’t run naked down the street, that sort of common sense thing.

Then we hit school and we were all put in rows, told where to go, when to show up, and what was required to move forward. And for twelve years of school and then on into college we were always told what to do that would move us forward.

Take these classes, get this degree, move on.

Very orderly. Mostly lock-step, sadly.

Then comes fiction writing. There is no school for fiction writers. Creative writing programs in universities are designed to crank out creative writing teachers. Not actual fiction writers. Yet all of us who want to be fiction writers need rules. We need someone to tell us the path to walk, where to sit, when to show up, and how to act. Maybe even what to wear.

But fiction writing does none of that.

Publishing is an international business that writers supply with product. It’s big business and it’s complex. And there is no set path to walk to get into it.

Is it any wonder a set of myths have built up around this business? For our entire lives we were trained to follow rules, then find ourselves in a business with no rules. And we think there should be, darn it.

Questions that challenge the RULES (MYTHS) of Publishing.

So, in the order of the chapters I wrote that are listed above, let me give you a few of the main questions asked in each chapter by people wanting rules and the thinking behind it.

Speed: “What do you mean that writing fast may be the best way to produce better product?” I always heard that writing slow was better.

Rewrite: “What do you mean I don’t have to rewrite unless I want to?” I always heard that rewriting was required, at least five drafts like I did in school.

Agents Sell Books. “What do you mean agents DON’T sell books?” Guidelines all say I can’t mail my own book to an editor.

Workshops: “What do you mean workshops can’t help me fix my story?” A dozen opinions of smarter people should always be better than just my own. RIGHT?

Self Promotion: “What do you mean that my ten book signings won’t help my New York publisher and might actually hurt my book?” I’ve always heard that you have to self-promote. That it is required.

And so on and so on through all 26 chapters so far. We all look for rules coming into this business because that’s the way we were trained.

Breaking that training is fantastically hard.

A Course of Study

So you want someone to tell you what to study? I can’t do that, because I don’t know each of you or your writing. Sorry. And if I tried, I’d be wrong. But I can give you a course of study on how to work against the myths every day and set up your own path into this business. Think of yourself as your own guidance counselor in college. Here is a suggested course of study.

1) Study regular business. Then any time any person in publishing suggests you go against a regular business principle, question it hard. For example: In regular business, anywhere, do you allow someone else outside of your boss to handle your paycheck? Or have a business where an accountant signs all your checks and you never see the money? Of course not! But that’s what you are doing with agents, folks. See all the agent chapters above.

2) Study how your own brain works. You know, the science of the brain. Understand how the creative brain functions, how critical brain functions, and then where your write from. Understand that your own voice will be invisible to you in your writing because it is the same as the voice in your head. Learn how your brain works because that’s where all this creative writing comes from. If you don’t understand how the brain works, you sure won’t understand why rewriting can be very damaging to your art.

3) Always go to writers to learn who are farther down the road than you are on a similar road you want to walk. Editors and agents can’t teach you how to be a writer. Ignore 99% of everything they say when it comes to how to write and how to manage your own business. And then ignore a lot of what writers ahead of you say as well, unless it makes sense TO YOU. Learn to listen to that little voice in the back of your head and question everything. But focus on continuing to learn from writers, both from books and writers’ workshops and conferences. Both craft and business.

4) Study the real lives of successful writers and their working methods. Ignore the hype like Hemingway telling writers they had to write standing up. But for example go find out how long it actually took Hemingway to write some of his classics, how long Dickens took to write some of his, and how long it takes many of our bestsellers to write their books today. Their public face will be one thing, but with some study, you can get behind the public story and to the truth. Every successful writer tells the truth about their methods once in a while.

5) Learn the true publishing business. Understand profit-and-loss statements, how editors actually buy a book today, what agents actually do in the system, what escalators are, what a good contract reversion clause is, and so on and so on. Yes, it’s a great deal to learn, but very possible if you learn it one detail at a time. Start now, with a hunger. It’s where you want to make your living, remember, and if you know more than others, you’ll know how to make more money than others.

6) Try everything once. At least. How do you know that your work isn’t selling because you keep rewriting it if you don’t try mailing out a first draft story or two? Call this course of study a lab class. Write fast, write slow, write a genre you don’t like. Try everything. Challenge yourself in every way you can think of. You might be startled to learn along the way what really works for you. Practice, practice, practice.

7) Stay up on current publishing and electronic changes. Even though a lot of writers and others are claiming the sky is falling and books as we know them are at the end, ignore that and just keep writing and learning. Your opportunity for a career might not be invented yet, or might be staring you in the face. This course could be called “current events.”

Okay, there you go, folks. A path, a course of study, seven simple areas, that will make you even more independent than you are now. I’ll bet your college counselor didn’t even boil it down that simply for you.

With knowledge comes understanding. Learn business, how your brain works, how publishing works, try it all, and stay current.

Okay, now that you have a course of study, here’s what’s ahead in this series so far. Again, I welcome suggestions.

I have shorter chapters on these upcoming myths:

—Bestsellers Can’t Write

—Writing Art

—Writing Media and Work for Hire or Romance is Actually Easy.

—Bestsellers Can Be Made Artificially by a Publisher

—Once you sell you have it made

—Rejections and What They Really Mean

—The Perfect Book.

—Publisher as Gatekeeper.

And, of course, more agent and money chapters to make people angry. Those are always fun and the agent myths just seem to be everywhere these days.

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Copyright 2010 Dean Wesley Smith
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Because of the new world and technology, my magic bakery got a lot more valuable lately. This is now part of my inventory in my bakery. (Confused on that, read the Killing the Sacred Cows of Publishing post about making money with writing.) I’m giving you this small slice as a sample. I’m giving you a taste, but not selling any of the pie.

If you feel this helped you in any way, toss a tip into the tip jar on the way out of the Magic Bakery.

And I would like to thank all the fine folks who have donated. Once this book is done, I will send you a copy. The donations and the comments both after the posts and privately are really keeping me going on this. Thanks!

If you can’t afford to donate, please feel free to pass this chapter along to others who might get some help from it. Every week or so I will be adding a new chapter on the myths and sacred cows of publishing. Stay tuned. Upcoming are chapters on bestsellers, losing control of your writing, having it made, speed equals making money, more on agents, and so much more. This business has a lot of myths. An entire book full.

Thanks, Dean

Okay, for those of you into a very complex but clear discussion about the current state of ebooks in publishing in the New York publishing world, and the history leading up to Wylie and other developments this week on this topic, read this post. Go slow. Worth the read.

It’s by Mike Shatzkin, one of the clear thinkers about the big picture in publishing. I don’t always agree with him, but his way of looking at things is clear and detailed.

Find it here.

Workshops finally all done here on the coast, writers sent home, my brain will return shortly and I will finish the next Cows chapter in the next day or so. But while you wait, try to digest that discussion linked above. The world of publishing is changing quickly, at this point almost weekly.

Konrath did an interesting look at the situation with super agent Wylie and his new move. I don’t agree with him in all areas, mostly in his thinking that publishers will fail, but it is interesting reading.

Find it here.

FREE FICTION

Each week, as I said last week, I will put up a new short story to read for free. The start of the story is below, with a link to Dean’s Stories web site. The entire story is there and last week’s story as well.

I will leave up two stories to read for free at a time. So make sure you come back regularly. This week a story about a date and a chance encounter with Marilyn Monroe.

A Vanilla Three-Way with a Cherry

When the ghost of Marilyn Monroe joins you and your girlfriend for a milkshake with a cherry on top, things change in a relationship, sometimes for the better. Especially when your girlfriend thinks she is Norma Jean.

Available in all electronic formats on Smashwords, Kindle, and Scribd.

Published by WMG Publishing.

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A Vanilla Three-Way

With a Cherry

Dean Wesley Smith

Someone had hung a framed, black-and-white photo of Marilyn Monroe right over the diner’s only urinal.  The picture was about a quarter life-sized, which made her a very dominating presence.  The bathroom was the standard restaurant bathroom, with a tile floor, metal stall, and painted walls.  It was as clean as I had ever seen a bathroom, no graffiti anywhere. 

Only Marilyn’s picture.

In the photo Marilyn had turned her shoulders sideways, keeping her face straight and looking over her shoulder.  She was wearing a low-cut black evening gown.  Real low cut, actually, with the old fifties-style bra cups that looked so sharp it could poke out a guy’s eye if he went in at the wrong angle.

The points on those breasts were right at head level as I stood at the urinal, and for half the piss I couldn’t look at anything else. 

Then I glanced up. 

Marilyn’s face was framed by light, almost angel-like. She stared down at me, sort of smiling, as if she had known when the picture was taken that some guy would be holding his dick while staring at her tits.

I almost couldn’t finish the job I was there to do.

And, to be honest, after looking into Marilyn’s eyes, I had trouble looking back at her breasts. It just didn’t seem respectful, even though those points were right there in front of me, and she was long dead.

So I kept my neck cranked upward, staring at her perfect face, that I-know-what-you-are-doing-smile, those dark eyes. I have no idea how long I stood there, penis flapping in the air-conditioning, just staring at her. I don’t even know what I was thinking. I had never been attracted to Marilyn before.

Finally, I realized I was finished and managed to pull away from the picture, get myself zipped up, hands washed, and headed out the door.

“You all right, baby doll?”  Betty asked as I slid back into the booth, her gum popping as it often did when she was flustered.  Clearly I had been in there with Marilyn for a long time.

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For the entire story go to Dean’s Stories.

Michael Stackpole did a great post a short time ago about electronic publishing. Go read this because in many ways he sounds like me in his disgust for writers who want to be taken care of.

Great post Michael.  Folks, read it here.

Since the week of workshops and deadlines has me wrapped up more than I expected, not quite done with the next Sacred Cows.

Yesterday, Kris and I were getting a laugh from a great song by new artist Sara Bareilles called “King of Anything.” You can find it at iTunes right here. At least listen to the chorus. And listen to it with agents in mind. I’m fairly certain, not 100%, but fairly certain she was writing the song about a bad relationship. But wow does it fit a bad agent relationship PERFECTLY.

On another topic:

Two nights ago about 14 professional writers got together in a room and we had a five hour discussion on ebooks. Even though I was the leader of the discussion, I learned a bunch and came away buzzing yet again. I won’t begin to talk about all the stuff here. But just let me say it’s a great time to be a professional fiction writer. Sure, things are changing faster than many can keep up with, but that’s exciting and with many of the changes, the mess that the agent system has become slowly loses its grasp on the business.

Someone asked me if I see agents surviving the changes. I said “Sure, some of them. The ones that have a good business model, who don’t read slush, who give added value to their clients in sales and contacts, who understand their clients and don’t try to control them or take care of them or tell them what to write.”

But my belief is that the agent model that so many of my posts have focused on will be gone. The publishers will have taken back over the slush piles in one form or another, and new forms of agents will emerge.

Also a new form of scam agent will emerge, so caution folks. Get control of your money and except for education, money flows to the writer. Again, never let anyone touch your money first.

Will book publishing in paper form be around in twenty years? Of course. In fact, there will be more books being published in paper. But the publishers will have changed. A large number of small presses will be flourishing, combing electronic and paper publishing. Larger publishers will be following the same model, combining paper and electronic publishing. Mass market paperbacks will be a thing of the past in twenty years, trade paperbacks will be standard, with hardbacks still being premium books.

But major New York publishers have a pretty hard turning or tipping point coming with all their contracts, labor unions, high overhead, the return system, and warehouses and shipping costs. When books go to 25% electronic in sales, the weight of the costs of each paper book will drive the price point too high and force even more of an change. Some publishers already see this coming and are doing their best to move, but the union contracts, high overhead, and returns systems pretty much has the big publishers caught in a nasty trap.

This all is going to take time to work through the system and in this day of instant fear and communication, we’ll see a lot of “the sky is falling” stuff. But nothing is falling, it’s changing. And the changes are fantastic for writers.

Stay on top of it is my suggestion. Ignore doom and gloom and just watch and move with the system. Learn the business, expect no one to take care of you, and keep having fun.

Now yet another topic:

I just got a very sad phone call from a friend who lost a cat today. Made me very sad, since we have lost five cats and gave another away in the last year. Two went from just old age, great old ladies names Willow and The Goddess. We put down another from sickness named Ezri. She was a powerful cat. When we had the full compound up here, we were always rescuing cats. Ezri was the last non rescue cat we had. The three we have left inside are all rescues.

But we also had two outdoor cats up until a week or so ago. Yellow Kitty and Rufus. Yellow Kitty was a wild male I managed to pet after two years and Rufus was a neighbor’s cat who left them for us. Both slept on our front porch in shelters and would have nothing to do with coming inside. Of course feeding cats outside brings raccoons and I was close friends with two and their yearly kittens. This year mom had four kittens. The raccoons and cats were buddies and even would eat from the same bowl.

Then one day the hilltop was silent. Both cats and all raccoons were gone. Something had taken them all. No signs of any of them. No signs of life at all.

So this last year we have lost five cats. We’re down to the three inside. In this big house, often hours will go by and I don’t see a cat. I can’t imagine being without cats around, but wow it is tough when we lose them. And my friend this morning was very sad, as he should be.

So if you have cats, give them a hug, enjoy their company while they let you, because they will move on faster than you want them to.

Just starting a workshop tonight and have already ran into a couple of the writers attending around town this morning. It’s going to be great fun. Kris (aka Kris Nelscott, Kristine Kathryn Rusch, Kris Rusch) and I are teaching a workshop on the structure of all the different types of mystery stories, from Cozy to Thriller and everything in the middle. A fun weekend with a bunch of fun writers talking writing. Doesn’t get better.

And then next weekend is a workshop on blurbs and pitches. First time we’ve done that one, so it could be really, really interesting and stressful.(grin)

However, the workshop that is the reason for this post is one in September called Character Voice. It’s an intense week of writing and study on character voice and all the ways it is created. We did this workshop earlier this spring and everyone attending made fantastic progress and say it changed their writing forever.

When your stories are bland and readers can’t tell your characters apart, you need to work on character voice. And it can be taught.

The publishing industry and reader demand is going to character voice as the most important aspect of writing. You want to see if I’m correct, just browse the books in any young adult section. They are all heavy character voice, and those readers will grow up to be adult readers wanting the same thing.

Editors are constantly saying they are looking for voice. Author voice you can’t see and only ruin with too much rewriting. It’s your personal voice. But character voice you can learn, alter from character to character. Good character voice thickens everything about your stories and makes them impossible to put down. It is possible to make your characters come alive and be memorable. There are some techniques that can be learned and practiced. And that’s what the week in September is about. Focused practice and learning how to do character voice.

We have three spots left in September 18-25 workshop. It will be limited to 12 since this is such a focused writing workshop. Kris and I just can’t read and give personal attention to more than that at this level of craft work.

If interested, e-mail me and put workshop in the subject line to avoid the spam filters.

I can’t begin to tell you how much that workshop, that week, will change your writing for the better.  But be prepared to work harder on your writing than you ever have before for one week. Those who attended in the spring said it was the most intense workshop we have given outside of the master class.

And for the workshops in 2011, the list is above under the workshops tab.

Cheers

Dean

FREE FICTION

Each week, as I said last week, I will put up a new short story to read for free. The start of the story is below, with a link to DeanWesleySmithStories web site. The entire story is there and last week’s story as well.

I will leave up two stories to read for free at a time. So make sure you come back regularly. This week a story about time travel and Shoeless Joe Jackson.

Black Betsy

Shoeless Joe Jackson made a mistake and was banned from baseball for life. Sometimes, in the Garden Lounge, the special jukebox lets a customer go back in time to a mistake and fix it. Shoeless Joe never had a chance to let the jukebox help him fix his mistake, but instead it allowed Shoeless Joe to do something even more important: Help a child become a better adult.

Available in all electronic formats on Smashwords, Kindle, and Scribd.

Published by WMG Publishing.
———————————————–

BLACK BETSY

Dean Wesley Smith

Eleven in the morning, December 5th, 1991.  The time and the day stuck in my head like the memory of my first kiss or the memory of my dad dying.   The weather that morning had turned unseasonably cold.  Not baseball weather at all.  A storm coming down the west coast from Alaska was projected to bring four inches of snow to the valley floor and light snow was already falling.  The storm would eventually drop almost a foot of snow and shut down the schools for two days.  But that wasn’t what I remembered about December 5th, 1991.  What I remembered about that morning was Edward Toole.  I turned on the jukebox that morning and sent him back to 1951.  Back to a time when baseball was important to him and to one other very special man.

I had just finished the morning bookkeeping for the Garden Lounge, made the deposit from the night before, and started the prep work for the day.  Light snow flakes swirled in a whirlwind just inside the front door as Edward entered.  He brushed off his coat, stamped his feet hard, twice and then moved through the empty tables toward the bar.  He was a big man, thick shoulders, thick  waist, with thinning brown and gray hair, and dark, brooding eyes.  He was the last person I would have expected to show up in the Garden at eleven in the morning.  He worked as a house lawyer for the big computer firm to the south of town.  He had a wife, two boys, and was the towns Little League baseball coach.  His usual drink was bourbon and water, with a twist of lemon.  He never had more than three in any given night and never before five.

He didn’t look up as he approached the bar, which was also rare.  Usually he was one of the most open and smiling people who came through the door.

“Morning, Stout,”  he said quietly as he pulled out a bar stool.  He took his coat off and draped it over the stool next to him, then climbed onto the stool closest to where I was working at the well.  I had been cutting fruit, so I still had limes, lemons, and oranges scattered on the waitress station next to him.

“Edward,”  I said.  “Good to see you.  Out of the office early today.  Heading home before it gets too deep out there?”  I wiped the lime juice off my hands and slid a bar napkin in front of him.  “What can I get for you?”

“The usual,” he said, then swung around on the stool and faced out over the empty lounge.  “You know,”  he said, seeming to stare off at the front door.  “This place looks the same during the day as it does at night.“  He laughed.  “Even the same smell of smoke and cleaner.  For some reason I thought it would be different.”

I glanced around.  The Garden was a small bar by current standards.  More like a neighborhood bar in the old fifties tradition.  It had a dozen vinyl booths, six tables, and a bunch of plants, mostly fake ferns.  The walls were a natural wood, dark brown, and the carpet was the same dark brown color.  The old oak bar filled the wall opposite the front door in front of a mirror and glass racks.  A classic jukebox  was framed in real plants to the right of the bar.  Except for Christmas Eve, the jukebox was never plugged in.  Background music was supplied by the stereo I hid behind the bar.

Most of the customers said the Garden felt comfortable, like an old sweater.  For me it had been home for five years.   And since I had never been married my regular customers, like Edward, were the only family I had.   

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To read all of this week’s free story, go to DeanWesleySmithStories.