Pulp Writer

by Margot Miller © 2006

 

 

Ideas for stories jump off the pages of the newspapers and three college students on summer internships cull them and put the clippings into plastic folders in preparation for Jonathon Silverton Smith, The Author. Smith is a prolific machine and turns out three novels a year and couple dozen short stories. My job is to change the names and genders of some of the likely characters, twist a few details, and submit each packet with its suggested alterations to The Master. Jonathon learned to write by stealing his ideas, plotlines, settings, characters, all from other writers of cheap fiction, beach books, soft porn, formula mysteries, and now he plunders the lives of real people. Besides the cullers, there is also a staff of readers, people who read what other people write and send him summaries with bits marked out to be considered for repêchage. Jonathon speaks a little French. He loves this term that means to fish something out for a second chance. He sees himself as the lifeguard of little story lines being washed away in the passing river of life. He gives us paperback editions of his books as performance awards, twice a year, but nothing else.

 

I get back to work harvesting the news and altering it enough to make it unrecognizable while remaining vaguely familiar. It's all I know since my own novels, two of them, were rejected so many times I stopped counting. I am the office manager and I pretend to be encouraging, telling the college kids we are feeding a very worthy horse who wins every race he enters. They work under me, harvesting the papers and the t.v. news, and are glad to have a job. The “readers” are outsourced and never come into the office, a luxury Jonathon can afford since he is such a prolific writer.

 

These days Jonathon's books are the only thing keeping me going. I've lost my interest in anything else, sports, eating out, movies, reading, even women. I've not had anything new to wear in two years and what muscle tone I had slipped off me as I lost weight and became more of a wraith than anything written by any nineteenth century mystery writer. My nose has gotten sharper and my hair stringier. I should get it cut, but I haven't the energy. I used to be considered interesting and witty. Now I am neither. I used to be considered a potentially good writer, I got a top-three once on Zoetrope, the agent who handled my novels said at least mid-list, best-selling with a little work. Now there is no mid-list, the best-sellers lists are full of Jonathon's and his ilk's books, and I don't even open my word--processor.

 

When I take the stack of possible plots in to Jonathon, he barks at me, “Put them there, Watkins,” indicating a small table next to his desk without looking up. He always calls me Watkins. My name is Jeremy, but no one here calls me that. “And don't stand there like an idiot. Get me a latte-mocha-chocha-maximus. And step on it.”

 

I retreat from the inner office and slip out to the local chain coffee house. No one offers to come with me, or asks me to bring anything back for them. We each take care of our own needs. At least, I think that's what happens. Sometimes I imagine they are a little group unto themselves and that they go to lunch together and talk about how pathetic I am, stuck in this job. The college kids will be moving on and are just doing this for a summer or the space of a semester off school, but I'm here year in and year out. I'm sure they think I am pitiful. I wonder if they read the books Jonathon's machine turns out. He has a staff of writers, but I've never met them. They work on another floor or at home and, although I have probably seen them in the elevator or on the street, I've not been invited to become one of them, not that I would. I'd rather be unpublished than published under someone else's name. I used to read Smith's bestsellers, but now they are all the same. I see the plots I worked out turn into mechanical trash and wonder if I'll ever be able to write again. Sometimes, I think I'll keep something good and not turn it in to him, but I never do. I just go back and forth between home and work and keep my pencils sharpened for making notes on how to transfer reality into fiction. I try to live separately from my job, but it doesn't seem to work.

 

At one of the café tables in front of Coffee Max's, a large man in dirty clothes, unshaved, with furtive yellow eyes, like a cat, leans forward, one elbow on his knee with his hand out. I try not to make eye-contact, but it's too late.

 

“D'you have any spare change?” he says listlessly, as if he already knows the answer, but he looks right at me, hoping he's wrong.

 

“Sorry, no,” I say averting my eyes and barrel into the shop where I stand for twenty minutes waiting to place Jonathon's order. When, finally, I have the steaming double-paper cup with it's cardboard caddy, I push though the glass door to the sidewalk and Yellow Eyes is still there. He's got a woman in a conversation. I think I should help her, pretend I know her, pull her away from his stare, his drug-induced blather, but I don't.

 

Back at the office, Jonathon is in a frenzy. His publisher has called for a twelve o'clock meeting and he wants me to attend and take notes. Of course I agree. I will not have lunch again today.

 

“You are so pathetic,” Jonathon says to me as we are leaving for the meeting. We will take the subway because Jonathon is cheap and won't pay for a taxi if he has to share it. He doesn't like to share anything with anyone. “You need to get some clothes. You look like a homeless person.”

 

We arrive five minutes early at Mason House Publishers and Jonathon closes himself in the men's room. I must wait for him, he says. Then, we are greeted by Suzie Goldsmith in the hall and follow her into his office. Suzie eyes me suspiciously, and I can tell she is thinking the same thing as Jonathon: I need a change of clothes. But I am showered and shaved. They talk about the books in press, the ones in line, the ones in his head—well, on his desk, but he says they're in his head. He is flirting with her and she seems to be susceptible, but you never know with an editor like her. She needs to keep the bucks flowing and Jonathon is a buck machine, or has been until now. He asks me to corroborate every now and then,

 

“Isn't that right Watkins?”

“Oh, yes. Yes indeed,” I say. And Suzie Goldsmith looks at me like I am something unimaginable. My mind starts whirring. Maybe she thinks I'm a character, something out of a novel, not exactly Dickens, but something to do with poor people slaving for rich Scrooges. My mind wanders off and I wish I could jot down an idea for a story.

 

Suzie Goldsmith stands up and the meeting is over. Jonathon and Suzie have agreed on something and I've missed it. They seem to be looking at each other funny, like there is something personal in it.

 

“You got that, Watkins?” he says. I feel myself blush, but he doesn't seem to notice.

 

“Um, most of it,” I say.

 

“Good. Let's get back to work then. We got a lot to do.

 

Outside, Jonathon is fidgeting. He debates with himself and finally hails a taxi. I am standing there like a panhandler, just watching.

 

“Well, get in, you idiot,” he sneers.

 

I get in.

 

“So tell me what you got and what you didn't get.” He is going to grill me in the taxi. I have no idea what to say.

 

“Um, she wants more stuff,” I start out.

 

“Didn't you hear her say my sales have fallen off on three lists now? We have to get out a collection of this new genre, really short stories, if I want to stay with her. She's gonna drop me if I don't come up with this new fast fiction stuff.”

 

“R…right,” I stammer, “you mean flash fiction?”

 

“Yeah, that's what she said, flash, like lightning bolts, she said. You know what she's talking about? Under a thousand words, like just enough time to take a dump?”

 

“Maybe.”

 

“We gotta crank out some good ones. We got three weeks to submit a list to her, so she can have the publicity fliers for the Book Show. It's a little war between Mason and the other Big Boys and she wants to win it. Where'm I gonna get a dozen stories in that time? If I don't get'em she'll go with someone else.”

 

I don't answer. My mind has wandered off again.

 

“Well, Watson, this'll be my special treat for you. Get me a dozen of these flash things and I'll split the thousand dollar advance Suzie promised me, if you can get me this material in a week. And an hour for lunch. You need to eat and you need to buy some clothes.” He has my attention again.

 

Back at the office, the three college kids take their feet off the desks as the elevator opens. Jonathon explains what we are looking for and they nod and seem to get back to work. I sit down and think about all the stories, many of them flash, I have at home sitting in drawers, unpublished, unsubmitted. And I want to cry.

 

As always, I'm the last to leave and on the way out I pass Coffee Max's again. Yellow Eyes is still there. I am irritated and allow myself to ask,

 

“Why don't you get a job?”

 

“I had a job,” he says. “I'm a writer. Just a little down at the moment. Lost my day job. This melts my resolve to be indignant and I say,

 

“Can I offer you a cup of coffee?” His eyes glint and he follows me inside.

 

“So,” I say, setting the two cups on the table, “What's your story?” And he launches into a tale that sounds too familiar. He's been writing for an anonymous mill for twelve years and suddenly he was sent a letter saying no more. Christ, I think, he could be one of Jonathon's, one of the writers I never see, the anonymous people who work on the stuff I put on Jonathon's desk. Yellow Eyes doesn't know what to do, because he hasn't written under his own name for such a long time that he's afraid to submit now. People will have forgotten him, not that he was ever successful on his own.

 

“But there're lots of writers just starting out. You could get something right off, if you're good?”

 

“I'm good, he says, “I bet I've published three dozen stories in the last five years under this slime-ball's name.” Now I was beginning to think faster.

 

“Can you write flash fiction?”

 

“Sure,” he nods. I got a ton of them. He taps his finger to his head.

 

“Me too,” I want to say. “So,” I venture coyly, “Could you bring some of them in tomorrow?”

 

“Why?”

 

“My boss is a pulp writer and he needs a bunch of flash stories in a hurry.”

 

“What's in it for me?” Yellow Eyes glares at me suspiciously.

 

“I'll split my bonus with you. He's offered me a five-hundred dollar bonus if I can bring in a dozen good stories within a week. Meet me here tomorrow at nine, okay?” He agrees.

 

The next day I meet Yellow Eyes at Coffee Max's to read his stories. At least six of them are very good. “I can use these,” I say, and I tell him my plan. We choose six of his and six of mine and we go to Staples to copy all the stories. We exchange contact information and agree to meet in the morning.

 

The next day, Yellow Eyes is clean shaven and fairly clean clothed, presentable. I treat us to a taxi, and we head up town. I have in my brief case a dozen stories, all retyped and formatted on a diskette. I have to tell the receptionist in the lobby I have some flash stories for Suzie to get in the building. But they will only let me in by myself, which I knew would be the case, of course. I tell Yellow Eyes to wait in the lobby.

 

“Well,” Suzie says when I arrive on the twenty-second floor, “this is a surprise. I didn't expect Jonathon to be this fast… or for him to not come himself.” There is a question in her voice. I ignore it.

 

“I brought my own stories. You probably didn't know, but I write flash fiction.”

 

“I thought you were Jonathon's man.” I let this pass too. She looks at me, curious. “You're undercutting Jonathon? Let me see what you have.” She smiles, something sly there. She sits down and reads one story, then another. I wait. She laughs. Good sign. Is that a tear? Better yet. She laughs again.

 

“Wait here. I've just got to get another opinion here.” She leaves the office. In a few minutes she returns with another editor. She introduces us and says, “We think you might be able to help us.” The fellow invites me into his office to talk terms.

 

When I get back to the lobby, I have two checks in my pocket. I pull one out and show it to Yellow Eyes, and we go straight to the bank to cash it. I give him his two hundred and fifty dollars and head back to Jonathon's office.

 

The college guys look at me as if they've been slacking and bury their heads in their work again. Then Jonathon barks at me,

 

“Watson, get in here! You're late.”

 

I call out, “I can't Jonathon. I'm busy. I've got a lot of work to do.” I open my brief case and start pouring the contents of my desk into it. The college guys' eyes are popping. Jonathon comes to the door of his office and watches, speechless.

 

Outside, I decide to head back uptown for a meal at a nice place next to Barney's.

 

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