Night Crew

BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!

“Scooooosssshhh..ha Scoooooosshhhhh.ha” “hhhsssssss”

Red light flooded through the western window as the sun bid farewell to the landscape below. It cast long shadows as the light floated in, touching the drafting table, chair and table.

Yawning, Len reached with his left hand and hit the alarm clock, almost knocking over the small picture that was resting beside it. He slowly rose from his twin bed and hung his feet to the opposite side and rubbed his eyes. He stood up slowly, stretched and sniffed the air which smelled of the freshly brewed coffee, he always craved.

After taking a quick shower and getting dressed in some loose, comfortable. clothing, he made himself a cup and sauntered over to the window and gazed down at the long lines of cars that marked the usual, evening traffic.

He smiled at the sight, shaking his head. “I don’t miss that at all.”, he commented, running his fingers through his thinning, gray hair.

He turned around on the plain, hardwood floor and went to his stereo, and turned on some ambient, trance music, adjusted the volume and walked back to his workstation.

“Turn down that gosh-awful goo-garbage!” his mother used to yell at him.

He grunted at the memory and made his way to the drafting table and sat down in the chair, pulling it forward towards the table. He cast a casual glance towards the little picture, resting on the alarm clock.

With a tiny click, Len switched on the swing-arm lamp he had purchased last week and positioned it where it would shine on the board.

He was about to grab some paper he heard an insistent buzzing sound coming from the bedside table. He walked over to it, and sighed as he saw the number. Shaking his head, he brought the phone to his work area and looked at it, then at the drafting table.

“I guess I cant ignore you, huh?”

He placed his cell on small table beside his drafting table, then sat down in the chair. He pressed “answer” and then “speaker” then opened his mouth.

“Night Crew! How can we help you?”

“Welllllllll!”, the female voice bellowed out like a goose with a bullhorn. “Look who deigned to answer the phone when his own mother calls!!”

Len rolled his eyes, grateful that she was just on the phone and not right in front of him. He took a sip of the brew and set it down. Grabbing a paper, he began positioning it on the drafting table.

“Hi, Mom! No.”, he quipped, while grabbing some masking tape.

“No? What the hell do you mean?”

“I mean”, he said placing the masking tape on the corners of the paper, “I’m not turning down my music. Next topic, please”, he sneered, drawing out each syllable like an old school master subtly berating student.

“Yes, I know, I know! You and your sacred , creative process! “, she replied, lowering her pitch an octave in resignation.

A slight smile appeared on his face while he stepped back to make sure the paper was properly positioned. “Wonderful! “, he intoned smoothly. “You actually paid attention! Perhaps I should do a whole lecture series on the topic, since even you managed to learn something!”

“Pfft! QOkay, smart-mouth! You cant be bothered to speak to your own mother! Can’t come by and visit!”

Len sighed as he finished placing the masking tape and moved his pencil holder closer to him as he stared at the blank canvas.

“Well!?”, came the voice on the phone. “Aren’t you going to say anything? No snarky comeback?”

Len yawned a moment and then replied. “Sorry, I just got up a little while ago, Mom, so I cant always come up with snarky comebacks. Besides, that might become too predictable.”

“And whats wrong with a little predictability? There has to be SOME stability.!”

“I already have stability enough. I worked for 30 plus years in the private sector and now, I can at last, do something for me instead of following the brainwashed herds in a never ending game of cubicles and ladders.”

“As for a visit, well, at the moment, it almost feels as if you’re already here, or pretty close to it, wouldn’t you say?”

There was a brief moment of silence as he reached for a pencil and started making some light lines on the canvas, the trance music still playing.

“Oh! You’ve got an answer for everything, don’t you?”

He smiled again, starting the sketching process, lightly touching the paper and making a barely perceptible outline.

“Okay”, she said, her voice only bearing a hint of sarcasm, “so what are you working on?”

“Well, I’m not sure. What do you think, Nebulae? Galaxies? …. maybe a desert landscape or something. Those sound good.”

An exaggerated sigh came from the phone. “If only you hadn’t taken, that third shift job all those years ago.”

“As I recall, you supported that, back in those days.”

“Well it made some money, yeah, but I hardly got to see you or talk to you. You were like a vampire!”

“Creatures of the Night! What beautiful music they sing!”

He could almost hear her eyes rolling. “Ha, ha, ha, ha! Real cute!”

“Well, I’m no Bela Lugosi. Say, that’s not a bad idea, though. I can draw a vampire. They seem to be all the rage these days and they bring to mind such imagery!”

“Oh yeah”, she said. “Dark castles in the mountains, landscape engulfed by an almost impenetrable fog..wolves howling in the distance…”

“Yeah and the great vampire, Dracula standing on a balcony, his red eyes glittering in the dark, while he tracks the scent of fresh human blood!”

She laughed. “Not bad at all! You sure you don’t want to be a writer?”

“Well, I’m writing it down now in my notebook. It’s good stuff.”

“Part of your process, I take it?”

“Yep”, he said with a smile, briefly glancing at the picture of his mother on the bedside table.

After a few moments, he turned back and took another sip of coffee, then went back to the drafting table, immersing himself in the process again.

Across the country, his mother made a soft smile, shaking her head. “So, you’re in the zone now?”

In the little apartment, Len smiled. “I am now. Thanx, Mom”

“Glad to be part of the night crew!”

A disfigured hand, almost skeletal, hung up the receiver on the old-fashioned payphone and shuffled out of the booth, body hunched over.

A few passersby saw her and gasped as she kept shambling forward on her long journey back to her grave.