Swords

Since I was out of town this week, I didn’t really have time to review anything. Because of this, I’m instead going to be sharing a short story that I wrote for my creative writing class earlier this year. Sometimes I’ll be posting stories, so here’s of one of many.

Rodney Shturm knocked over the old alabaster statue that his grandmother had given to him when he got out of bed. He had tripped over one of his 17^th century backswords, the kind used by English cavalry. The statue, a bust of Aristotle or Plato or one of the other Greek philosophers, had fragmented terribly. Its ear was lying five feet away while its neck lay just next to the old mahogany table it sat on. Half of its face had been completely destroyed, and it manifested as a pile of chunks and chips. Rodney didn’t care; he ran downstairs, grabbed a dustpan, and swept it all up. “It was always such an ugly statue,” he remarked to himself. Rodney then picked up the backsword and gently slid it under his bed.

Rodney went back downstairs where he poured himself a bowl of cereal. He went to sit at his table but stopped. The table was covered in old magazines, lists, and his Indian moplah and khanda swords. He decided he would just sit in his recliner, but he quickly discovered that it was where he had decided to set his Ethiopian shotel. The curved blade was digging into the well-worn upholstery, so he couldn’t easily remove it. Rodney decided that he would sit on his back patio. All that was outside were his two Chinese hook swords, each hanging on the back of his one good patio chair. The other three had all been destroyed through the yearly wear and tear of use, both for sitting and for holding swords—albeit temporarily. Rodney sat down and began to eat.

He looked out over his backyard. The grass was dead from lack of water but he didn’t care. Rodney’s water bill was too high as it is. It always was, because every month, like clockwork, the Japanese odachi he was working on would burst into flames and almost burn down his shed. Rodney had a similar problem when he was forging his Indo-Pakistani talwar, but he eventually discovered that he was heating the sword up too much during the heat-treating phase. By now he had finished his bowl of cereal and he went back into his house. He set the bowl in his already full sink. Rodney didn’t feel like washing them. Tiffany always took care of that, but she was gone. She had noticed that Rodney was becoming more and more distant in their relationship, until she eventually told him it was her or the swords. She left later that evening.

Rodney decided to sit down and watch some television. He removed the shotel, but only after ripping out a small chunk of fabric. He set the sword on his coffee table and grabbed the remote to his 85-inch television and turned it on. He flipped through the channels until he found Forged in Fire. The contestants had to forge a 17^th century rapier. “That’s easy!” Rodney shouted at the contestants as if they could hear him. “Forge something hard for once like a Viking ulfbehrt sword!”

Rodney shut the television off and set the remote on the small table next to him. He stood up and angrily kicked over a stack of encyclopedias. Old sticky notes and tattered pages went flying out and littered the floor. It was almost 11:00, so Rodney went into his room and grabbed his backpack. Since it was Tuesday, he only had his world history class, which didn’t start until 11:30. Rodney took his book out to do some last minute studying for the test today. They were learning about the Crusades, and Rodney was actually looking forward to class today. His textbook was in terrible condition due to years of use and abuse. When he bought it, the textbook wasn’t in the best of shape, but his frequent fits of rage led it to become one of his many causalities. It bore a few slight marks from his Indian urumi. After reading over his notes, Rodney decided that he should get to class a little earlier than usual.

Rodney was dismissed at 12:45 like he usually was, even though some students weren’t finished with the test. Rodney had thought that it was pathetically easy, but there were a few tricky questions. His teacher posted the results later that day around 5:30.

“What?!” Rodney screamed. “How did I only get a 93%?” His face was livid. He grabbed his massive zweihander and walked outside. He went into his shed and brought out a crate of watermelons and an old cassette player that his grandmother had given him last year before he went to college. He set up the cassette player and turned the volume on high. He didn’t care if it bothered his neighbors. He grabbed his favorite cassette tape, one he had made himself that was jam-packed with his favorite songs from Linkin Park, Five Finger Death Punch, Slipknot, Disturbed, and Simon and Garfunkel. He set up the watermelons and began slicing away with “Psychosocial” blaring away behind him. After exhausting himself physically, Rodney shut off the cassette player and put it back in his shed. He cleaned up the watermelons and threw the eviscerated chunks away. Then he went back inside and took a shower.

After showering, Rodney sat down and turned his television back on to Forged in Fire. This time the contestants were forging a Chinese butterfly sword. “Shoot, I forgot about those,” Rodney mumbled to himself. “Better add it to my list.” He went over to his cluttered kitchen table and began to sort through a pile of papers and sticky notes. Eventually he found the paper with his list of historical swords that he still wanted to make. He grabbed his other three lists, labeled “Movies”, “TV Shows/Anime”, and “Video Games”. He took all four lists and hung each up on his wall with the help of his four Indonesian karambits. “There,” he murmured to himself, “now I can’t forget them.”

As Rodney was walking downstairs, he heard someone knocking on his door. He answered it and was greeted by a police officer and his neighbor. “What seems to be the trouble officer?” he asked feigning kindness.

“I’ve been getting reports on your loud music and disruptiveness for a few months now,” the officer replied. “Today marks your neighbor’s tenth call. On the tenth call, we always send someone out to talk with the disruptor. Basically, unless you quiet down, you’ll be fined.”

“Thank you for the warning officer,” Rodney said through gritted teeth, barely holding together the fake smile plastered on his face, “I’ll be quiet from now on.” The police officer and Rodney’s neighbor both walked away, quietly whispering to each other. Rodney closed the door. He walked up to his bedroom and took his replica of Glamdring from The Lord of the Rings off of his wall. He took it into the next room where he began hacking and beating a thick, wooden post that was already scarred with months of anger. After this, Rodney prepared for bed, but instead of reading American Psycho like he usually did, Rodney decided to go over into one of his cluttered shelves of books and encyclopedias, taking out Eat, Pray, Love; a book that Tiffany had given him as a gift for their first Christmas together about nine months ago.

The next day Rodney woke up late. It was Wednesday so Rodney had his algebra class. Rodney despised algebra because he saw it as a waste of time. History was always more interesting anyways. The only thing Rodney hated more than tedious math was being late. In a rush, Rodney haphazardly brushed his teeth, threw on the nearest pair of clothes, not caring if they were dirty or not, and grabbed a bagel. While speed walking to class, Rodney used his French trench knife to cut his bagel and apply the cream cheese. Rodney was already in a bitter mood, not just for waking up, but also for subconsciously listening to Justin Bieber for an hour and a half. Rodney always made sure to set his alarm to play the very best, the very worst to Rodney, of Justin Bieber every morning so as to make sure that he didn’t wake up late. Rodney hated Justin Bieber even more than algebra and being late. While walking to class and scarfing down his bagel, Rodney began to mutter to himself.

“Must have been that book. It lulled me to sleep and left me feeling so peaceful that Justin Bieber somehow seemed soothing. Makes me miss Tiffany. Maybe I should call her. We met at that Halloween party at Burt’s when I was freshman. Nine months. I was happy for nine months until she left.”

“No don’t call her you idiot! She’s not interested. Besides, she’s done with all her mandatory classes, so she’s probably too busy to even think about talking to someone like you. Besides, you clearly were more attached to those swords than a girlfriend.”

“Ok me, I get it, I screwed up. I wanted to make the perfect anniversary present for her but I knew it would take me a while so I had to start working really hard on my swords. I really do miss her though.”

“True, you did seem happier when you were with her. Call her after class. Good idea me.” Rodney reached his algebra class with three minutes to spare. He made sure to angle his backpack so that the other students nearby couldn’t see his trench knife or Eat, Pray, Love. He would never use his weapons to hurt anyone, but his classmates didn’t know that. Rodney scrounged around, pulling out torn notebooks, bent folders, and an almost empty can of mints. Rodney offered his nearest neighbor the mints. The boy readily accepted so Rodney gave him the whole tin. There went one less thing Rodney needed to deal with in his cluttered backpack. After another minute of fishing out old wrappers and receipts, Rodney found his math books in the front region of his backpack. His math book looked like it had experienced similar abuse to his history textbook, except one of the slash marks from his replica of Hrunting was clearly indented on the front cover, and the bottom right corner on the back was cleanly chopped off.

After another boring lecture, Rodney leisurely strolled back to his house. He was done with classes for the day since his English class was cancelled due to the teacher “not feeling it” (the teacher had recently been dumped by his girlfriend after claiming he won the Powerball Jackpot, only to realize that he smudged one of the numbers so it looked like an 8 instead of a 3). Once he reached the front door, Rodney saw a note taped to the front door with a decently sized cardboard box on his doorstep. He read the note: Hey Rodney, it’s me Tiffany. I wanted to stop by and say hi but you weren’t home. I figured you were at class so I quickly scribbled this note and left the present. I have another one for you if you want to come over for dinner tonight around 5:30. I’m making taco salad (with Doritos) because I know it’s your favorite. I really do want to talk, and I would really appreciate it if you came over. I’m running out of things to say so I’ll talk to you later I guess, bye. –T.

Rodney couldn’t believe what he just read. He grabbed the box and quickly went inside. He opened it and discovered a perfect replica of Elucidator, a sword from his favorite show. He was speechless. He took the cardboard box and threw it haphazardly on his couch. Then he went upstairs with a hammer and nails. Rodney began to crudely hammer the nails into the wall over his unmade bed, creating a makeshift sword holder. Rodney carefully put the sword on his wall then stood and admired it. Rodney picked up Eat, Pray, Love and began to read. He had some time to kill and he figured that if he brought the book up and initiated a conversation over it, then Tiffany would see that he wanted her back and appreciated her gift.

Before he knew it, it was already 4:30. Rodney began to get ready. He quickly threw on one of his more worn Ralph Lauren polo shirts and a nice pair of Levi jeans. He then spritzed himself with some of his Creed Pure White Cologne and got into his Arash AF10 Hybrid. He reached Tiffany’s apartment and awkwardly made his way up the stairs, dropping his keys multiple times.

“Shoot, I should have gotten her some flowers,” Rodney angrily muttered to himself. He soon reached Tiffany’s room; door 77. He held his breath as he went to knock. His hand stopped an inch from the door, hesitation and fear taking hold of him. Rodney took a deep breath and knocked. A moment later she opened the door.

“You came!” Tiffany exclaimed happily.

“Uh huh,” Rodney awkwardly replied. His tongue felt swollen and he was paralyzed by her look. She smiled sweetly. She was just as beautiful as Rodney remembered her with her slim, black glasses, caramel hair that cascaded down onto her shoulders, and sweet, innocent face.

“Come in,” she said as she motioned for him to follow her. He entered and sat down on her couch, still speechless. “You’re dressed nice.”

“Th…Thanks. I feel a little overdressed now,” Rodney awkwardly chuckled.

“Don’t worry about it. I just wanted to be comfortable so I threw on this old sweatshirt my dad gave me, and I didn’t feel like changing out of these yoga pants from yesterday.”

“I still find it funny that even though you’re basically wearing pajamas, you still look absolutely gorgeous.” Rodney said after finally regaining control of his voice.

“And you’re still as flirtatious as ever,” Tiffany responded teasingly. “Dinner’s ready.”

After dinner, Tiffany went into her room and came out with a box. She silently handed it to Rodney, beaming the whole time. He opened it. Inside was a replica of Dark Repulsor, another sword from his favorite show.

“Th…Thank you.” He stammered.

“I knew you’d love it.”

“And I do, but not as much as you.”

“So you do still feel that way. I was hoping that you did, and part of me though you did, but I was still worried that you had already moved on. I want to get back together, I really do. The only problem is that I think we need to take our time. I feel like our last relationship was just so rushed that it was doomed to fail. Besides, I want to get to know you a bit better as a friend first.”

“Ok,” Rodney responded, disappointment and despair reverberating throughout his thoughts. The rest of the night went by without incident. Rodney did his best to mask his pain through copious amounts of bubble gum, but the tension still manifested itself tangibly in the air. After an awkward goodbye, Rodney went home for the night.

Once home, Rodney put the replica of Dark Repulsor on his wall right next to the replica of Elucidator. He grabbed his replica of a Vorpal Sword and went outside. The cops didn’t let him off with a warning this time.