META: The Common People anthology
David J. Warner
DESCRIPTION
The Common People is a short-story anthology based on the Marvel
Universe and their concept of mutants being born with "amazing"
powers that separate themselves from other humans.
All Common People stories are currently being archived on the World
Wide Web at the following address:
http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/4234/common.html
In the future, stories from this page will be posted to the
alt.comics.fan-fiction newsgroup with the header TCP: in the subject
line. Those who wish to post their own Common People stories to
a.c.f-f are asked to use this header.
Example:
Subject: TCP: Monster in the Mirror, by David J. Warner
WRITER'S GUIDELINES
The idea behind The Common People anthology is that there are other
mutants in the Marvel Universe that we never see, and we're all
curious as to how this affects their lives and the lives of those
around them. When writing a story for this anthology, be sure to
follow these simple guidelines:
1. The stories must primarily be about original characters.
Established Marvel characters should have no more than a small cameo
part in any story (if any part at all).
2. The general subject of the story must be about 'normal' life - the
idea being to portray mutants among normal society, eating dinner,
going out, working, watching TV, going on holiday etc. Obviously, you
should try to leave this as open as possible - avoid the sorts of
superhero-saving-the-world-fighting-group-of-evil-mutants storylines
we read in the comics all the time.
3. Spandex costumes are only allowed on established Marvel characters,
and probably shouldn't feature too heavily in the story.
4. Please, please, PLEASE format the text of your stories correctly --
lines wrapping at less than 80 characters, no funny swigglies
representing ASCII symbols, etc. I don't intend to archive any poorly
formatted stories. here
Other than that, it's all up to you. When you've finished, you can
either post your story to alt.comics.fan-fiction, or mail it to David
J. Warner at manc...@netcom.com, and it'll be on the site soon
afterward.
Enjoy!
David J. Warner
Archivist for The Common People
--
------------------- |*************THE BUCKTOWN TIMELINE HOMEPAGE*************
David J. Warner | A Generation X(tm) fan-fiction thread
manc...@netcom.com | gone COMPLETELY out of control
------------------- |-*NEW SITE*---->http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/4234<-----
Kristina Sennvik
manc...@netcom.com (David J. Warner) wrote:
This one isn’t a bit funny...It involves a mutant, but no one from the
Marvel Universe and should fit TCP-criterias.
Any comments, criticism, praise or flames are welcome!
Please do not re-distribute without my consent. Molly, Tidbit, mama
and He are copyright of me and may not be used without my permission.
***************************************************************************
There is a girl walking down the street. She looks ordinary; blonde
hair, green eyes, skinny. She’s about nine years old. Her name is
Molly. She lives with her mama. Take a closer look and see how tired
her face is. How deep her frowns are. She is ticking off items on her
fingers as she walks. She mumbles to herself.
”Milk, bread, butter and coffee”, she says. ”Clean the floors. Do the
dishes. Take care of mama”.
This is an unusual day. A social worker is coming to see her mama, to
see how they are doing. Molly knows that her mama isn’t doing well at
all. Also, He might be there. She always thinks of him as He. He is
perhaps her father. No one knows. They have the green eyes in common,
but little else. He brings the bottles and the sweet-smelling tobacco.
Molly hates him.
She opens the street-door, walks in. The elevator smells of old urine.
She breathes through her mouth. Six floors up, her mama is waiting for
her. Six floors up, the prison doors will slam shut behind her. She
doesn’t push the ground floor button. She doesn’t run. There’s no
place she can run to.
He is there. Molly sees his boots in the hall. When she peeps into the
living room, she sees him lying on the couch, snoring, sleeping one
off. His fly is open. His hairy belly is bare where he has unbuttoned
his shirt. He has spread beer cans all over the room. When she walks
past him her socks get sticky from beer stains on the floor.
”Mama”, she says loudly.
There is no answer. Molly has learnt not to expect any answers from
her mama. She opens the bedroom door. Mama lies on the bed in her
nightgown. The ashtray is full. Molly takes it.
”Put it back”.
Molly does what she is told. She is very good at figuring out what
people want, but mama isn’t like most people. Mama seldom thinks in
terms of wanting and not wanting, she just reacts. Molly leaves the
room quietly, because mama isn’t going anywhere and Molly must clean
the flat before the social worker comes.
Tidbit, her cat, is awake in the kitchen. He circles around her legs
and purrs. She adds cat-food to her shopping list, then lifts him up
and cuddles him. Tidbit doesn’t want to be held, though, he is hungry.
He struggles in her arms until she puts him down.
Molly goes to the shop. She cleans and washes the dishes. She tidies
up and takes out the garbage. Tidbit has eaten his food and lies
amiably on the kitchen table, waiting for her to scratch his stomach.
Now it’s only the hard part left. Molly goes into the living room
again. She looks hard at Him. Then she pushes the Button. Everyone has
at least one Button. His Button involves money and a dealer. When she
pushes it, he leaves in a hurry. The first time she tried it was when
He beat mama and wouldn’t stop. It still works. He wakes with a start,
goes straight out in the hall, pulls on His boots and walks out the
door.
Mama is even harder to do, because Molly still loves her. It is a love
mixed with disgust and fine threads of hate, but the one Button strong
enough to get mama out of bed makes Molly feel queasy. Still, if they
place Molly in a foster home, no one is going to take care of mama. So
Molly closes her eyes and pushes the Button that makes mama think
she’s on fire.
Thereis a yell. Mama comes running out from the bedroom and throws
herself in the bathtub. Molly has filled it with warm water and
shampoo. She takes the pressure off the Button and washes mama’s hair.
She hands mama a toothbrush with peppermint toothpaste on. They have
Fisherman’s Friend at home, too. Tidbit walks into the bathroom, but
backs out with an offended look when he realises how much water it is
in there.
No one has done the laundry for a long time and Molly has to search a
long time before she finds a dress that’s half-way clean. With an
apron to conceal the big tomato smear on the front, it looks pretty
good. Mama doesn’t notice. She is falling asleep again.
The doorbell rings and the social worker enters. He says their
apartment looks very nice. Then he asks some questions. Molly makes
mama answer them in a relaxed, friendly way. The social worker talks
about how he had considered sending Molly to a foster home, but how he
changed his mind when he saw how clean and pleasant their home was.
He asks Molly some questions too. By now he has been there so long
that she can see one of his Buttons. It is about wandering around
alone in these housing areas. It isn’t a very strong Button, she
realises as she pushes it. She will have to create one if she wants to
make him leave really quick.
She creates an image of Shere Khan in his head, magnifies it, then
turns it inside out. There is her new Button. And as if on cue, Tidbit
jumps into his lap. He screams, then rises and says goodbye. Their
social allowance will be disbursed on Monday. Someone will be back
next month to see how things are going. Keep the cat away from me, he
says, then goes away.
Molly leads mama back to her bed. She hears the sound of a key turning
in the lock. The door opens, His boots are kicked off and He goes
straight to the bedroom too. Molly takes Tidbit in her arms and climbs
out on the fire escape.
The night is dark. Stars are bright only in tales. Molly buries her
face in Tidbit’s warm fur and cries. To her, crying is natural as
rain. She does it all the time, from strain and weariness and fear.
The strain comes from taking care of mama. The fear is another matter.
What frightens her most of all is herself. She could create a Button
that made Him jump out of the window. She could kill Him and she feels
rather sure that she will, one day.
The worst thing of all, however, is the Button she installed in
herself. The Button that makes her believe she isn’t alone. The one
that makes her think Tidbit exists. In the harsh light from the street
lamps she sees clearly that her arms are empty.