I thought it might be nice to post a free short story here. Kind of a thank you for joining me on my rambling nonsense about writing, publishing and all that. So here’s my tale – Writer’s Block. Hope you like and if we don’t speak before Christmas, have a good one, people.
WRITER’S BLOCK – Luke Walker
He sipped more wine, then pushed his food around the plate. It was the same whenever he struggled with a book. His appetite went on holiday and the urge to break out the oldest bottles in their wine cupboard came visiting.
“Go on, then.” Jane broke off another chunk of garlic bread. She offered it to him and he took it without wanting to. “What’s going on with the book?”
“I don’t know,” Brian Holt replied. That was almost a lie. The truth was a growing thing, pushing at his eyes and his denial. Weak snow spattered at the window; the curtains were open slightly and the lights in the back garden made the falling white shine.
The truth of the day. The truth of the winter dragging on towards Christmas next week; the third week of December and no end in sight to the bleeding fire of early sunsets. The truth of his writing dragging. Dragging into work instead of a joy.
“Brian,” Jane said, eyebrows raised. She was not a stupid woman. That, combined with twenty-five years of marriage, meant she knew him in deep ways.
“It’s nothing major.” He swallowed more wine and gave up on the pretence of wanting to eat. “The usual first draft rubbish. It’s all gone a bit messy over the last week.”
How to tell her the real truth: that the book was more than a bit messy or in the middle of fairly standard early draft issues. The book was work without the slightest element of joy in the writing, the creation of the world and its characters. Not like the early days of writing because there were people with lives and voices ready to sing on the page. There’d been worlds to explore, then. Before the contracts and the publishers, his agent and her deadlines. And definitely before the promotion side of it. The interviews; the book tours; the asinine questions and dull anecdotes he was forced to trot out.
“When does Susan want it?” Jane asked. She wasn’t the biggest fan of his agent despite Susan’s sterling work in the role. He was a wealthy, successful man. There was no argument with that and no argument with a lot of that success coming from Susan Cocker. She all but beat publishers into better deals for him and he suspected she threatened marketing departments with physical violence lest they ensure the ads for his new books were given priority over the more genre-focused writers. He was a rare beast and he knew it: a globally successful literary writer. He could afford to never publish another book again, but where the hell was the sense in that? Or the joy?
“Beginning of March,” he replied, realising Jane was still waiting for an answer.
“Can you ask for an extension?”
“I might have to.” He dropped the piece of bread he’d barely nibbled at and sipped wine. “I really can’t see it being ready. It’s. . .it’s not coming.”
“At all?”
“No, not really. It’s weak. It’s pedestrian. It’s pointless. It says nothing.”
There it was. His fear over his eighth novel. That it spoke no truth. And without truth, he was doing nothing more than typing. A hundred thousand words that didn’t matter in the least because it was a task, a job, a role he’d somehow fallen into over the last thirty years.
“I’m sure Jack can hold fire for another couple of months,” Jane said.
He shook his head. His editor was a patient man; calm, too, but like everyone in the chain between author and publisher and the great unwashed, he had his targets and his money to be made. Jack would no more hold fire than Susan would.
“He’s already asking Susan how it’s going. She’s dropped a few hints over this week. Nothing direct or supposedly pressure-inducing, but it’s there. I’ve got next to no time to fix this and that’s making it worse. It’s. . .not coming.”
Jane set about clearing away the remnants of their meal. He ran a hand over her hip as she stood and pictured the papers beside his laptop. The pile had remained at the same level for the last fortnight.
“Take two days off,” she said from the kitchen. He picked up his wine and followed her. “Reboot. Recharge. You’ve said it yourself plenty of times. You can think about it without thinking about it.”
She was at the dishwasher. Music played, low and soft, from the silly toy their son Ed had bought them the previous Christmas. Despite it being almost a year old, Brian had yet to touch the damn thing and told Ed during their Zoom conversation last Christmas Night that he’d always wanted one. Zoe had been home then; his daughter had seen the lie and feigned shock.
Jane made sense. Two days without the laptop and the document staring at him. Two days in the world of real things. He could go for a pint once or twice. It had been weeks since he saw anyone in their local pub. A walk through the village; reading for pleasure; a call to Zoe in London and Ed in Paris, checking on the good lives his children were building.
And no sense that his work was a dirge. A widening pit, sucking in any pleasure he’d long since forgotten in the act of exploring new people with their lives eager to commit to his hands and his page.
Only the ticking clock and the dying days of the year between him motionless over the keyboard and the agent, the editor, the publisher and the public all hungry to have a piece of his creation.
Brian pulled his hand into a fist, pushed back on the frustration threatening to spill over and stepped towards to his wife.
He fell forward, too surprised to yell, too shocked by his right foot being utterly dead to make a sound.
***
Brian managed to walk for about a mile before admitting that his pace wasn’t slow to due to the ice or the thin layer of snow. It was his bloody foot.
He carried on for another few minutes, passing the Green where two women walked their dogs, and drew alongside the high wall bordering the new secondary school. Vines dangled over its top, the green speckled with frost. He could hear the voices and the shouts of the children beyond the field behind the wall: a steady noise of exuberant life as the kids readied themselves for the last day of term. The pub was another five minutes but he wasn’t going to make it there in that time. Not at this crawl.
He stopped at a bench, sat and peered at his shoe. But it wasn’t the shoe, was it? He’d been in his socks the previous evening when he tipped forward like a drunk and Jane grabbed him by the shoulders. He’d slapped hands on the sink and his wife, keeping upright by luck over design, and told her his foot had gone to sleep.
Not the sock or the shoe. The foot. And it was the same now. A dead foot.
He tried to bend his ankle. Nothing happened. He tapped his shoe and heard the noise, but felt nothing in his toes.
Although the sun was strong and the sky cloud-free, there was no warmth in the air. Gritting his teeth against the teeth in the icy breeze, Brian untied his shoe and pulled it free.
One foot. A thick sock. Ten toes. An appendage that had served him reasonably well for sixty-three years and one that had, by the sense of touch, abandoned him. Attempts to wiggle his toes were pointless. He rubbed them, felt nothing, and tapped on his ankle. The sensation was there – just. If he’d been sitting on it, he would expect pins and needles at any second. Grimacing at the anticipated feel of the slush, he placed the ball of his foot on the ground. The cold registered along with the suggestion of damp, but neither sensation was anywhere near as strong as it should have been.
Suddenly sure people were watching him – a silly old fart on a bench, staring at his foot – Brian checked the pavements. One of the women from the Green was on the other side of the road and walking in the direction he’d come and while any number of people could watch from their windows, there was nobody out and about. The day was too cold for pleasurable walks and the warmth of his house with a fresh cup of coffee beckoned. Jane was at work; she had a production of Lear to oversee and wouldn’t be home until about seven this evening. He had the day to wonder about his foot and to write.
“Sod it,” he muttered and slid his shoe on. Coat zipped to his neck, focus on his feet, Brian stood and managed to walk at an old man’s shaking pace. Every step took concerted effort and awareness of his legs as if they belonged to another. Sweating freely, hot below his layers, he took twice as long to walk home as he had to reach the bench. Door locked, coat flung at the stand and shirt sticking to his back with clammy eagerness, he pulled his shoes free and all but dragged his foot to the kitchen, then his study.
It was time to forget about the issue with his foot. It was probably just a trapped nerve or age or one of those passing things.
He sat heavily, eyed the screen as the device came to life, then ran a fingertip over the manuscript. All he had to do was turn over the latest page, re-read it and then drop into this new world.
As simple as that.
An hour later, Brian lowered his hands and had to close his eyes.
Barely a hundred words, his fingers hunting and pecking, and the rhythm of the words and the language lost to him. It was a dance and he had no partner.
He needed to tell Susan there would be a delay. It was inevitable.
Eyes open, his focus forced, Brian typed out an email to his agent and sent it without proofing it.
“An extra month. That’s all I need.”
She’d agree. She had to. He was the writer, for God’s sake. Everything began with him. There was no process or role for anyone else without his creation.
His work.
Abruptly furious, he slammed his fist on the desk, causing his laptop to bounce and sending a few pens rolling to the floor. Reflexes automatic, he reached for the falling pens and they bounced off his fist.
He watched them fall, end over end, then stared at the fist he couldn’t open.
***
Dr Palmer looked like a child’s idea of Father Christmas – or so Brian had always thought. Tall, overweight, happy eyes and a white beard. He’d been their family doctor for thirty years and appeared to have aged, at most, ten. Brian tried to put these loose, rambling thoughts from his mind while he sweated in the air-conditioning set to hot and listened to what the doctor told him.
“There’s no obvious sign of nerve issues or problems with tendons. No overdone exercise or walking?” Palmer rubbed sanitising gel between his fingers, the smell strong in the bright room. “Too much writing?”
Brian looked at his hand. It was flat on his knee. He could move the fingers, albeit slowly, and he felt it as part of his body, but it still was not right. No more than his foot.
“Not much chance of that.” He pictured his fingers moving from key to key two days ago, stumbling from letter to letter as if he hadn’t been typing for decades.
“Not overdoing any exercise?” Palmer asked.
“Not much chance of that, either.” Brian tapped his stomach. He’d put on a stone over the last year and kept planning on taking up walking as exercise.
“It wouldn’t hurt you to shift a few pounds.” Palmer smiled. Two middle-aged men who enjoyed good food and expensive wine, sharing the joke of their bellies and their appetites. “But in the meantime, I’ll arrange an appointment for you at the hospital. X-rays and so on. You may have to wait until the new year unless I can pull some strings. I can’t see the slightest indication you’ve broken anything. There’s no pain or inflammation. No strains or sign of pulled muscles.”
Brian shook his head as Palmer listed the issues he didn’t have.
“How are the books?” Palmer asked.
Brian flinched. He felt it in his face and tried to turn it into a cough. Palmer wasn’t fooled.
“Up and down at the moment.”
“Still selling millions?”
“Well, not quite, but they’re doing okay.” He never liked to talk about the success he still occasionally thought was a dream. It was tempting fate as well as gauche.
“Working hard?” The doctor’s tone was light. His eyes were not. Behind his glasses, they were focused, unblinking.
“As always. Well.” Brian pursed his lips. “I’ve taken the last three days off the words to get over a challenging bit in the new book and then this happened.” He nodded at his foot, then raised his hand. Making a fist required actual concentration. Opening it made him sweat further.
“Challenging?” Palmer asked. Outside his office, a door closed and low voices passed by. The blinds were down; the sunshine was bright enough to show the flakes of wet snow brushing the glass as they had the other night before his foot went dead.
To sleep. It went to sleep.
“Yes. It’s. . .it happens. I’m not a hundred per cent okay with the book and the characters. Things slow down and I have to step back. Walking helps. Fresh air.” He smiled weakly.
Lies. All of it.
“In that case, I would suggest this is physiological.” Palmer indicated Brian’s foot and pointed to his hand with a pen. “Stress. The creative mind pushing the body without care of the effects. I have no idea if writers’ block actually exists. I don’t care, frankly. What I will tell you, Brian, is that it or something like it may be having an impact on you, physically. I will still put you forward for the x-rays. In the meantime, I would suggest as much rest and relaxation as possible. Don’t work on your book. Give yourself the rest of the month. Have a proper Christmas break. Cut back on the coffee, the wine even if it is the silly season. Walk. Stretch. Keep things simple.”
He smiled and Brian expected him to hold his belly and laugh.
Rest. Walk. Stretch.
Relax.
He could laugh as he’d pictured Palmer doing. Susan had already replied to say she could give him a couple of extra weeks, but things were in motion. Schedules agreed; spends agreed. Yes, of course, she appreciated it was art, not shoving out a product to the shelves; she wanted his best as much as he did and the last thing he needed was to over-exert himself, but if he could get the draft to her without an extensive delay it would do him the world of good to put this stage of the process behind him. In the meantime, have a splendid Christmas, Brian. All best. Susan.
The process.
Not writing a book because he had a story that needed to be told. The process.
“Get some rest. Decent sleep.” Palmer rummaged in a drawer and passed Brian a leaflet. “Some exercises in there. They’ll keep the muscles moving.”
“Thank you.”
He had to get out. From the heat and the smiles and this man he had never seen anywhere outside this building. Back through the town, out to the village and his doors closed against a world of demands and process.
Pulling on his coat and catching the sleeve on the hand he hadn’t realised was a fist, Brian said goodbye to Palmer and limped out to the reception where he asked the receptionist to call him a taxi. Driving for forty years and his car remained locked in the garage because he couldn’t use his sodding foot properly.
Texting Jane took twice as long as usual. He deleted the message three times before settling on telling her enough.
Palmer says I need to take another couple of days off. X-ray soon but nothing broken. Just a dodgy foot. Let me know when you’ll be home. Chinese takeaway?
She didn’t know about his hand and wouldn’t know he couldn’t easily cook dinner.
Brian pocketed his phone and moved to the windows, waiting for his taxi. At his side, the lights and tinsel draped upon the surgery’s tree flickered. Watching car roofs gleam and a few birds flying in the dazzling light, the thought he’d been blocking for forty-eight hours broke through.
What if I can’t write? What if my hand seizes up?
He stared at his hand. He wiggled his fingers. More or less.
***
Brian woke to the sound of the en-suite shower and the mutter of the radio. Even though it had been many years, he still missed Wogan in the mornings. But then, he missed quite a lot of things, didn’t he?
Brian bared his teeth at the ceiling. Mauldin, nostalgic, bitter. He’d become all these things and worse without realising it. Drifting into sleep the night before with Jane’s shape and heat a blessing at his side, he’d rejected his self-pitying waste of time and decided to embrace the magic of his life. First world problems. That was how Ed referred to this sort of business. Gone days were dead days and there was nothing to be gained in remembering the wild ride of telling a story and spending months with new people in his early fiction. He still worked in the same manner and was the same writer. Agents, editors, marketing teams and pointless questions from interviewers who’d read, if he was lucky, the press release about his new books were all just background noise to the real importance.
Writing.
And it was time he remembered that.
The shower switched off. He thought of Jane in there and glanced at the beside clock. He probably had half an hour before she needed to leave the house and fall back into the bosom of the Bard. It wasn’t long but it would be enough.
Smiling, Brian flexed his fingers. They were tight but malleable. He pulled the covers back and shifted to get out of bed.
His legs from the knees down were utterly dead. It was like trying to shift rocks.
He stared at them, thoughts of joining Jane in the bathroom wiped clean.
Move.
The lone word was an alarm bell pounding in his head. He knew he was suddenly perspiring; it was second-hand news and the salty droplets on his skin did not belong to him.
Brian wheezed and kneaded the unresponsive flesh of his shins and knees. Skin moved. He pushed and knew his fingers were on his legs but he knew it only from sight. Wild terror beat a rhythm and it was a terror of being discovered in this state. Of being caught.
Enough rationality remained for him to know the idea was insane. He was in trouble, not guilty of anything. Even so, the rat of panic scampered through his chest, little claws sinking deep into his lungs and his heart. He was caught. Jane would walk through from the shower at any second. And. He. Was. Caught.
“Fuck.”
Brian spat it at his legs, spittle spraying, and thumped his shin. It stung his fingers and failed to register on his leg.
At first.
Seconds after the blow, a faint warmth spread towards his knee from the impact. The skin had reddened. He did it again, an inch below the first thump. Nothing again, then more warmth.
“Come on, you bastard.”
“Brian? Are you awake?” Jane called.
“Yes,” he replied, smiling at the door she’d left ajar. His eyes were too large; his mouth was a rent in his face and he was going to fall into his own smile.
“Coffee’s on,” Jane said. She was still in the bathroom and had he been thinking barely a minute ago of the normality of embracing his naked wife? Had he been that man instead of this man pummelling and spitting at his dead legs?
Stand. Get on your feet.
It was a fine idea. He would see it through.
Grunting, shaking, Brian pushed on his left leg, shoving it to the right so both fell over the edge of the bed. Feet landed on the carpet. He could see his toes.
Caught in an awkward bend, Brian pushed back on his fists and slid over the bed. At once, he tipped to the side and broke a fall by slapping a hand on the wall. Sweat, cold and oily, soaked his body. Despite the winter, he often slept naked and the room was warm. Too bloody warm. He longed for bracing air and blinding sunlight. To walk in both. To run across winter fields as he had a child.
“You will move,” he whispered to his legs.
They didn’t hear him.
“You will move, you bastards.”
They’d become a stubborn animal, a beast that wouldn’t obey his command, and he had nothing because he was losing control.
No. He’d lost it.
“I’ve got breakfast on,” Jane said. She passed by the bedroom door, shadow brushing the wall, and Brian’s sight greyed. If she pushed on the door, if she. . .if she. . .
Jane moved on. “Don’t take too long.”
“I won’t,” he called with mad joy.
Jane reached the stairs and descended. Brian panted, bent over and pushed at his knees. It took him a few seconds of staring at both hands to realise he was pushing with bent fingers. Fingers he could not uncurl.
Then he cried.
***
Quarter past twelve. Brian knew that because his hands were in view and he could see his wrist.
It was around the time he usually stopped for lunch. Perhaps some soup; perhaps a bacon roll or two.
He didn’t think lunch was on the menu today.
Jane hadn’t been happy he was going to the book before breakfast or even before managing to dress properly. He’d mollified her by saying he would eat in a few minutes; it was just to get a few notes down on the problem. He’d switched the laptop on and fumbled with it as she came up the stairs, calling his name, and he’d hidden his left hand under the desk. A promise to his wife, turning to her to kiss and hoping she didn’t see what was wrong because he was. . .
Caught.
It was a stupid, nonsensical idea. He wasn’t caught at anything. He was guilty of simply trying too hard with his stories and letting them write him instead of him writing them. There was no writer’s block here.
“No block,” he whispered.
His manuscript remained beside the laptop. He kept a small bin next to the desk and longed to shoved the whole thing over the edge into the bin. Yum, yum, said the bin. Thanks for the meal, Brian. Yummy.
“Yummy.”
There was no active screensaver on the laptop and how he wished that wasn’t the case. A loop of photos would be better than the email from Susan.
Asking about his health; assuring him they had time and in the next line but we can’t hang around too long, Brian. It’ll be up to your usual standard; I have no doubt of it.
Jack was champing at the bit; his editor had his work to do before the book went any further and oh, by the way, Brian. There are a few interviews lined up. The Mail, the Times and the Literary Review are all keen to have a word, and we’re looking at Tracks of My Years on Radio 2 which will be nice. So, drop me a line later. Best, Susan.
“Best,” Brian muttered.
It was snowing again. Thicker flakes than recent days. They tapped on the glass as if seeking access. Christmas snow as the year gave up the ghost and people drank and laughed in that growing silence.
Jane wouldn’t be home until gone six. The house would be dark by then and he wouldn’t have dinner underway. Brian shifted his gaze from the screen to his manuscript.
There was no real extension for him and his work and there was absolutely no way back to the joy of creating. There was here and now: the snow on the windows, and his body outside of his mind.
Jane would find him in his chair. He hoped he would be able to move his eyes to his wife when she did. He hoped he would be able to look away from his unfinished manuscript.
Luke Walker - Writer