Fast Fiction Friday

For the considerable future a better name for this would be old fiction Friday. But, I have some stuff that has been sitting around in a drawer for years. I might as well put it out here. Feel free to point and laugh as you see fit.

THE LOCATION OF MUSES

The Atlanta coffee bar was proof that cloning existed.
College boys and girls sat in neat little rows behind glowing Macbooks and spoke to each other in quiet tones about bands, art and sex. They all wore contact lenses that turned their eyes green and chatted with accents that denied their Georgia, Alabama and north Florida roots.
Except for Brandon and Emil.
They tried to fit in but they were not expert imitators, yet.
"Look I just need two hours back in her apartment," Brandon said
before slurping his frappachino.
"I just don't get it man, she's got a restraining order on you, this could be bad," Emil said.
Emil had two glassfuls of diet Coke that he was slurping quickly and
refilling nearly as fast.
"Hey, trust me. It's a solid plan. I'm the thinker here," Brandon
said. "You just lure her away for four hours. That will give me enough time to finish the book."
Emil pointed nervously at Brandon's computer.
"There you go, finish it, what's the deal with her apartment?" he said.
"I don't know," Brandon hissed. He noticed his fellow clones giving him questioning looks and immediately resumed a small voice.
"I don't know. The first night Jennifer let me stay there I wrote three chapters," he said. "In the month we were together I nearly finished my novel. And it's great, I mean it's not just good, not average it's great I've got two chapters to go and then I swear to you fame and fortune are not far behind. But I just got to get back into Jen's apartment to do it."
Emil scratched his beard and pushed his glasses back from the tip of
his nose. Emil had been Brandon's pal since they were in middle school
together. The bonded over Star Trek: The Next Generation and comic books.
"Man they'll put you under the jail if you break that restraining
order again," Emil said weakly.
In their entire friendship Emil had never won an argument. He was going to lose this one too.
"I don't care," Brandon snarled. "I haven't been able to write anywhere else and I have to finish this."
Emil shifted in his chair and switched tactics.
"If I can get her to go out with me, serious if, what will we do for
four hours to keep her occupied?"
"Just let her talk about herself," Brandon said. "Jennifer is Jennifer's favorite subject."
Emil called, as instructed, on a Thursday. Jennifer recognized his voice as a man from the shadows of the scene. The girls thought him cute but unlawfully quiet. She said yes to the free dinner.
After Brandon watched her leave he was overjoyed to find that she had
not yet changed the locks.
"Thank God she's cheap," he said to himself.
To Emil's surprise Jen gave him plenty of signals that she liked him.
They talked about parents - overprotective and needy, jobs- she didn't
want one, she would settle for being a model, old relationships - Emil talked about an ex who tried to kill him with a butter knife. It was an old joke he told well.
However, he didn't add the part of the story that changed it from a joke to a painful memory.
"When she went nuts and came at my neck with the dull blade, I deserved every bit of her wrath," he thought and did not say. She told him about her crazy ex Brandon and Emil laughed in all the right spots.
"So he just wouldn't leave," she said. "I mean we broke up, he cried, I cried we had the goodbye sex and then he didn't leave. He just sat down and continued writing on that damn computer.
"So I let it go for a while. But he kept showing up. I mean he didn't bother me, didn't try to screw me, he just came in, sat down at the dining room table and wrote."
"What's he writing?" Emil asked.
"He wouldn't tell me. He just said it was a novel," she said. "I think that's part of what drove me nuts. He just sat there, with all the personality of a log and wrote. I mean it got ridiculous. I had a party, there he was. I had a boy over, there he was.
"One time I had a five friends over and slept with a new guy that my sister brought over. It was a big step for me to finally get over Brandon. And I woke up the next morning, went upstairs to cook my eggs and the bastard was there, writing, he'd been there the whole night."
"And that's when you put the restraining order?" Emil said.
"Yea, how'd you know about that?" she said.
"Well, it's just logical I mean he's obviously nuts," he covered.
Jen gave Emil a hard stare. Then she shrugged, her red hair fell in
her eyes just a little bit.
"He's more than nuts, the boy's loco," Jen said as she reached for
one of Emil's french fries.
What she left unsaid was that at times she still missed Brandon and
that made her hate him more.
When they got to her door Emil wrapped his arms around Jen and kissed
her softly. He did it without a word or a warning or even a wink. She ran her fingers through his hair and when the kiss was finished she licked his upper lip to let him know she meant business. Then they opened the door and saw Brandon sitting at the kitchen table typing.
Jen looked at Emil who did not look as surprised as he should have and suddenly she understood the phone call and the conversation.
"Bastard," she said as she punched Emil in the chest. Then she ran to the stairs weeping. She tripped over her own legs but caught herself on the banister. Moments later disappeared behind her bedroom door.
Emil looked at Brandon pitifully.
"Ass, I was gonna get laid," he said.
"Sorry," Brandon said.
"It's been five hours why aren't you gone?" Emil said.
"I added an epilogue. When the cops come I need you to stall them."
"I don't stall cops, cops have tasers, and pepper spray and guns."
"Another thirty minutes and I'll be done, I can feel it, it's coming
to a head," Brandon's voice sang with excitement but he kept his gaze
and his fingers locked onto the computer.
Emil crumpled to the floor in defeat. When the two large city patrolmen walked into the apartment Jen came out of her bedroom with a victorious look on her face.
"That one is breaking a restraining order and please take his friend with you when you go."
The lead cop placed a beefy hand on Brandon's shoulder and spoke with
whiny authority.
"Let's go."
Brandon looked up at the man in blue.
"I've got two sentences left here just please give me a minute," he
pleaded. "Son, you need to get up and go with me right now before
something bad happens."
Brandon turned back to the computer and began typing furiously.
"I can't I'm almost done," he said. The cop yanked him out of his
seat and nearly across the room. Emil instinctively jumped up and went
for the officer's chest. And that's when both officers went for their
night sticks.
Broken, handcuffed and bleeding from multiple wounds Emil and Brandon
we're escorted out into the cold night air.
As he was being put into the back of a cruiser Emil turned to Brandon.
"What's your novel about?" he asked.
"Spies."