Use this to create your own work (due next Monday). You can do this in whatever way you like:
a. keep the text exactly as it is and write an ending to the short story. The result will be a collaborative work between you and me.
b. borrow the premise that you use in your own story/poem/essay/digital art
c. create an equally ridiculous premise in your own story/poem/essay/digital art
d. create a completely different premise in your own story/poem/essay/digital art
Directions: Write your story in a Google Doc with a shareable link. Post this link as a comment below before class on Monday Oct. 19.
"Killing Alec" by Dr. Marquardt
Of course Alec had been cheating on
me. He had been cheating on all of us: Caroline, Anje, Tiffany and me. So we
decided to kill him.
Caroline and I had figured it out sitting
next to each other on a full bus, both of us playing on our phones. It was a
city bus. I might have been sitting next to anyone.
“That looks like my boyfriend,” she
told me as I flipped through photos of Alec. She looked more closely. “That is
my boyfriend.”
There was some brief hostility, but
we calmed down. We even had coffee, compared notes, and decided to take out an
ad in the newspaper to see if there were more of us. Several women responded,
but Anje and Tiffany were the only ones willing to meet. We suspect there are
more.
Alec didn’t deny it. “My love is
big,” he said. “One person can’t contain it.”
“Bullshit,” we said. He admitted
that it was, though he still preferred not to die.
“It’s not that grave an offense,”
he said.
“It is,” we said. And then Tiffany cited
the Bible and that got us tangled up for a while. Anje offered the analogy of a
dog, one that bit too many people and had to be euthanized. And everyone agreed
that this was the better argument.
“She and I never dated.” Alec
pointed at Anje, who shrugged. She had seen the ad. She was in it for the
solidarity. We appreciated that. Alec thought it was nice, too.
“Would you like to die by firing
squad?” Caroline asked. “Aureliano Buendia style?” And this irritated me
because I thought reading Marquez to each other in bed was our thing, but I let
it go for the cause.
Alec recalled some Monty Python
skit in which a man was chased off the edge of a cliff by a herd of beautiful
women wearing only helmets and knee pads. “That would be preferable,” he said.
But Anje nixed it on principle.
“And besides,” she said. “There aren’t any cliffs around here.”
“How about a guillotine?” Tiffany
offered. “It’s supposed to be painless.”
“Guillotines require kneeling,” I
said. “Alec’s knees are bad.”
“They’ve gotten better since he
started his prescription,” Caroline said. It turns out she was a pharmacist.
That was how they met, actually.
“How about a manhunt?” Tiffany
said. “Like those films you like.” And we all got pretty excited about this. Alec
agreed that it was the best option.
To be sporting, we gave him a lot
of leeway: anywhere in the world and a full day head start. We each kissed him
and wished him luck. Then Anje drove him home because we suspected he might be
in shock and not ok to drive.
