The Nowhere

HUSTLE

Breathe. For a moment let the gridlock rock alongside you, not with you, he managed to make his body think. The pace was exhausting. The up and downs. The roller coaster ride he had been riding. It reminded him not of the expensive, steel roller coasters he had become accustomed to at an older age; it was the wooden, rickety circular one that constantly made his brain hurt and his stomach drop to the point of near vomit.

The stomach pains. They came with the rush as well. Results of the ride, he would make himself believe during the moments of questioning realization. It’s all part of the ride. You can’t expect to ride the ride, go up and down the god damn hills and not expect to get sick. Sure, his stomach was barren, naked at times from the caffeine he had plunged it with; coffee, espresso, energy drinks riddled with sugar when times where especially pressing became aides to get through the haze of fatigue when times where rough. The stomach pains, the constant bleeding through his anus, the dry heaves. They were effects of the struggle. The ride to the top he envisioned for himself ever since he was a tot and now seemed closer than ever to achieving.

It didn’t hurt that he was the youngest editor on the staff. He was the youngest editor they had ever hired. He wasn’t the smartest, no (that had to go to Greg Swanson, who was fluent in three languages, had translated several obscure Italian neo-realist authors before his undergraduate graduation, and could, accurately, name every Pulitzer winner and their eventual offspring creations after winning the award), or the most connected (Doug Manawitz; father once held court at The New Yorker, came from the richest bloodline of Polish Jews on the Eastern coast), but he was definitely the most driven. He was always the first one in the building, often rivaling the morning cleaning crew, and was, at most times, the last one to leave, once again excluding the ever-present janitor. His fingers would blaze over the keyboard, his eyes scarcely ever missed an err, and his taste for simplified language, for the elimination of complicated feeling in others writing, made him a favorite amongst the higher ups. He had, in his mind at least, the common man in mind and wanted the common man, or woman, to enjoy literature as he had, without the common pretensions that came with being well read. Just give me a good goddamn story he found himself chanting whenever the opportunity arrived.

It didn’t hurt that he had talent either. His first published short story, The Funeral, had been published in various dispatches across the greater state of New York. It was a rough story, full of lashed emotion and great declarations (“It was then, at that very moment, when he felt the burden of masculinity, of being his father’s son, be lifted and the clearness, the after the storm leveling, that he finally broke down and found himself crumbled into spasms of emotion. To feel, to let himself be remorse, was something he had disallowed for some time. He was human once again!”) stuck out, but it showed signs of a great budding talent. It took his third published story, The Screw and Everything After, for the New Yorker to take notice, and for Chris Stratton, the young, idealistic writer, to finally get paid for what he believed he had been born to do. To write. With the slight acclaim he had achieved with actually being published in the Holy Grail of discovering new talents, he forced his way into Banbely Publishing, the Holy Grail of publishing new, exciting voices. Sure, it was only an editor position and his struggles to balance creativity with professional responsibilities scared Chris to death that he found himself gasping at times on the subway, eyes bulging, but it was an entrance none the less. He had found a loophole in the ever-impenetrable entrance to literary greatness and he planned to exploit for all he good. Hence, the rush.