sanemagazine: wonderful rubbish

The following is a brief excerpt from the novel Sleep(s) on Chickens, by William Murphy

She strode across the dance floor and the eyes all around the place followed her every stride, the way her dress swished about the legs she'd spent the early evening eyeing in the mirror, as if daring them to poke unnecessarily at the nylons. The way her hair's sheen looked enough like the women on the television commercials under the low lights of the dance floor and the walkway leading past the bar that it was a shame she couldn't see the effect herself, except for the mirrored and decidedly less stunning version in the mirror behind the bar and the multicoloured bottles. The way the dead guy walking next to her happened to be wearing a tuxedo.

At least that's what a few of the comments were regarding, a few were directed towards his conscientious efforts not to walk through stairs but instead to step up them and not pass his hand through the railing or, when they had danced briefly out on the dance floor, the way he tried rather desperately not to pass through her in any manner which might be considered obscene or inappropriate by onlookers, a good deal of whom, he was sure, were eager to judge the dancing prowess of dead people.
Overall it was making him quite tired, and she could see that he was playing with his cuffs in an uncomfortable manner and it wouldn't be long before he either asked to go or just pretended to fade out and, once invisible, slip out the door and back to his flat. Which is why she'd stopped their attempt at dancing, and why she was rushing them back to the relative safety of the back room they'd been sitting in when she decided he'd stop moping about his state of being.
Fitting him into the tuxedo had been an ordeal in itself, her having to ask entirely too many metaphysical questions for her own taste to try and figure out if, indeed, a dead person who happened to be still exhibiting some degree of corporeality could wear clothing at all (barring the clothing that he had died in, which was luckily a reasonable pair of tan trousers and a mostly unwrinkled white button-down shirt ('luckily' she always added after the first time she'd seen his wardrobe and the inordinate number of torn jeans and his collection of moths that apparently didn't eat any holes in his shirts but instead crumpled them up into surpisingly compact balls of cotton and squirreled them away in the back of the closet, as he'd blamed the state of his wardrobe, with conviction, on the moths, when she'd enquired as to his common/fashion sense)), most of which she hadn't bothered with since she'd left college and stopped ingesting entirely too many drugs.
Metaphysical ponderings which were largely unnecessary when it turned out he could simply think himself a new wardrobe. Which he'd apparently figured out the first time he went to answer the door and an attractive reporter from a local magazine was waiting there to interview him and he happened to have been previously dressed in torn jeans and a tshirt from a concert he didn't generally make public knowledge he'd attended. Which is one of the reasons (granted, possibly more vindictive) she decided to take him up on the dance floor.

disclaimer:
"'Martingale', of course, is a bit of a gambling term; the one whereby you simply keep saying 'Double or nothing' if you happened to lose the first bet until you reach some obscene amount of money, still saying 'double or nothing' in the vain hope that you'll not lose one of these times and wind up getting yourself back to the comfortable state of not owing anyone anything much. (Until the next time you gamble, naturally.)
Which is, of course, exactly how Sleep(s) on Chickens has been going all along. Without so much gambling and a whole lot more hassle from publishers and the like, including a firebomb or two, under the guise of New Year's festivities."
Thus spake William Murphy, from his home on the hill in Worcester, Massachusetts.

Sleep(s) on Chickens is slated to be published in the Autumn of 2001.


				Martingale
		archives horoscopes accessories contacts theatre fables home Add Sane Magazine to your My Netscape.		The following is a brief excerpt from the novel Sleep(s) on Chickens, by William Murphy She strode across the dance floor and the eyes all around the place followed her every stride, the way her dress swished about the legs she'd spent the early evening eyeing in the mirror, as if daring them to poke unnecessarily at the nylons. The way her hair's sheen looked enough like the women on the television commercials under the low lights of the dance floor and the walkway leading past the bar that it was a shame she couldn't see the effect herself, except for the mirrored and decidedly less stunning version in the mirror behind the bar and the multicoloured bottles. The way the dead guy walking next to her happened to be wearing a tuxedo. At least that's what a few of the comments were regarding, a few were directed towards his conscientious efforts not to walk through stairs but instead to step up them and not pass his hand through the railing or, when they had danced briefly out on the dance floor, the way he tried rather desperately not to pass through her in any manner which might be considered obscene or inappropriate by onlookers, a good deal of whom, he was sure, were eager to judge the dancing prowess of dead people. Overall it was making him quite tired, and she could see that he was playing with his cuffs in an uncomfortable manner and it wouldn't be long before he either asked to go or just pretended to fade out and, once invisible, slip out the door and back to his flat. Which is why she'd stopped their attempt at dancing, and why she was rushing them back to the relative safety of the back room they'd been sitting in when she decided he'd stop moping about his state of being. Fitting him into the tuxedo had been an ordeal in itself, her having to ask entirely too many metaphysical questions for her own taste to try and figure out if, indeed, a dead person who happened to be still exhibiting some degree of corporeality could wear clothing at all (barring the clothing that he had died in, which was luckily a reasonable pair of tan trousers and a mostly unwrinkled white button-down shirt ('luckily' she always added after the first time she'd seen his wardrobe and the inordinate number of torn jeans and his collection of moths that apparently didn't eat any holes in his shirts but instead crumpled them up into surpisingly compact balls of cotton and squirreled them away in the back of the closet, as he'd blamed the state of his wardrobe, with conviction, on the moths, when she'd enquired as to his common/fashion sense)), most of which she hadn't bothered with since she'd left college and stopped ingesting entirely too many drugs. Metaphysical ponderings which were largely unnecessary when it turned out he could simply think himself a new wardrobe. Which he'd apparently figured out the first time he went to answer the door and an attractive reporter from a local magazine was waiting there to interview him and he happened to have been previously dressed in torn jeans and a tshirt from a concert he didn't generally make public knowledge he'd attended. Which is one of the reasons (granted, possibly more vindictive) she decided to take him up on the dance floor. disclaimer: "'Martingale', of course, is a bit of a gambling term; the one whereby you simply keep saying 'Double or nothing' if you happened to lose the first bet until you reach some obscene amount of money, still saying 'double or nothing' in the vain hope that you'll not lose one of these times and wind up getting yourself back to the comfortable state of not owing anyone anything much. (Until the next time you gamble, naturally.) Which is, of course, exactly how Sleep(s) on Chickens has been going all along. Without so much gambling and a whole lot more hassle from publishers and the like, including a firebomb or two, under the guise of New Year's festivities." Thus spake William Murphy, from his home on the hill in Worcester, Massachusetts. Sleep(s) on Chickens is slated to be published in the Autumn of 2001.


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