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Well, Part 2 of the Zounds! story went up this morning. Unfortunately, I’m afraid the story might be just a little slow to get moving at the beginning… Hopefully it will be more engaging a little later on.
We haven’t gotten any feedback on it yet… that could meant that either no one is reading it, or no one likes it enough to give any…
Time is something that we have in very short supply, but we will be adding to the pages, such as “About”, and “Characters”.
I’m debating whether or not was want to increase the frequency of the posts. It seemed like an eternity went by before part 2 went live. We may go with something of a Monday/Thursday post cycle a little later on – after I have a lot more of story ready to go.
Check back next week for Part 3!
A heavy-set, aging man is seated at a slightly nicer desk than the one outside, wearing a nice, grey suit, and smoking a cigar.
“Ah, Doug. I wasn’t sure who ‘Mr. Wesley’ was… What can I do for you today?”
“Well, sir, I’m afraid it’s the same problem as before…”
“Sit, sit, and lets see.”
Doug pulls a wooden chair up to the desk, and sits, cradling the folder on his lap. He pulls a sheet of paper out and hands it to Mr. Wright before continuing.
“Well, you see, I went to the zoning office, like you said, and they copied this for me to bring to you… See? It’s dated just a few weeks before my Father… passed away… on April 16th, and it shows the land to be privately owned… but then, see, there is some city-owned land here to the west…” Douglas stabs at the paper with his index finger, and then digs back into his folder for another page. “But then, if you look here, the day after my Father’s funeral, on May 5th, there is a new record that shows up that says the land is owned by the city, and the other section that was city-owned has disappeared… now, what’s strange is that they don’t normally do these zoning censuses but every couple of years… and no one has any record of them doing this most recent one, but this is the one that is being treated as current… it doesn’t add up…”
Mr. Wright takes a long drag on his cigar, and leans back in his chair. “Seems to me that maybe there was a mix up, and the first one was wrong, so they fixed it.”
“Yes, but the first one was the correct one… this second one is wrong…”
“No, happens all the time in this business. Records get lost, moved around, get the wrong date on them…”
“Well, couldn’t that mean that this new one is the wrong one?”
“No, I don’t see how…”
“Well, the people at the zoning office that I talked to said they didn’t go out and do a survey on this date… on May 5th. They remembered doing the survey in April…”
“Who was this that said that?”
“Um… his name was Frank… something… I don’t remember…”
“Well, you see, no doubt he was mistaken, or simply forgot…”
“But, Mr Wright, my father… his whole life is in that house…”
“I’m sorry, Doug, there’s nothing that I can do about it… I can’t allow you to inhabit, or trespass on land owned by the city, especially not land that’s designated a level 3 zone for animal habitation…”
“Well, then why was my father allowed to build there to begin with?”
“Another mix up, I’m afraid.”
“Then will you at least let me move the stuff out of the house? If it’s not supposed to be there in the first place…”
“No, I’m afraid that’s completely out of the question. A level 3 zone must not have any human contact for the safety of endangered wildlife, to ensure they are breeding, and whatnot. I would end up in serious legal trouble if they found out that I let you go in there… not to mention what they would do to you, my boy.”
“How can I get this solved so that the correct survey is used?”
“Nothing to be done about it. I would just forget about the whole thing and move on with your life. Since there wouldn’t be anyway to prove the land was in fact owned by your father…”
“Like what?”
“Hmm? Oh, nothing, just an… idle thought… no, just forget about it.”
“What if I could locate the deed?”
“No, well, maybe, it would depend on a lot of things… it’s probably not worth it to go looking for it… even if you could locate it, since it’s not in any of the official records, I doubt it would have much of an impact. Now, I really do have some work to do, if you would please…”
Douglas frowns at the man for a moment before gathering up his papers, and stomping out of the office, slamming the door behind him. Mr. Wright sits at his desk for a few minutes, frowning as her hears the outer door slam, rattling the glass pane, and then picks up the phone, dials a number, and waits for the answer.
**Yes?**
“We still have someone over there? For security?”
**Red’s there now. Sleigh relieves him tonight. Why?**
“We might have a small problem with the kid.”
**…I thought you were dealing with it. Why is he still bothering us about it?**
“I am. I don’t know… he’s stubborn.”
**…Too stubborn for his own good… don’t worry. He shows up and one of the guys will deal with it.**
The line goes dead, and Mr Wright hangs up the phone, leans back in his chair again, and takes a long drag on his cigar, holds it, and then exhales a thick cloud of smoke into the air. Then he grabs a notepad, and scrawls onto it: ZONING – FRANK ??? CLEANUP!!!
We begin our story with Douglas, who is standing outside of an official-looking building, complete with marble steps and columns. Above the entrance, carved into a large brass plate, says “City Hall”. He is holding a thick folder stuffed with papers under his arm. He looks up at the brass plate apprehensively for a moment, and then he sighs, drops his gaze to the ground, and climbs the stairs up to the door. He purposefully walks through the dark hallways through the building – he’s been here far too many times not to know the way – and comes to a stop at a door with a large, frosted glass window set into it. The window has a simple picture of a house in a circle, and the word “Housing” engraved across the top. He opens the door, steps inside, and pulls the door shut behind him. The office is dark, with no windows, and only one lamp that seems like it’s on the verge of going out. The floor is tiled with a checkered pattern that probably had been black and white at some time, but has now faded to a yellowish-brown and, greenish-grey color. One lone wooden chair sits against the wall, which is papered in a faded, green wallpaper. On the opposite wall from the chair is a desk, next to a wooden, unmarked door, which has clearly seen better days, where a young, blond woman is sitting, intently focused on finding the right key to press on the typing machine in front of her. Douglas steps over to the front of the desk, and watches her type, thinking to himself that there always seems to be a new secretary here… and wonders if there’s a simply a lot of them that work different shifts, or if there’s a high turnover… Her nose is only inches away from the keys, and she spends an uncomfortable amount of time between each key press, apparently having to read through all the keys on the machine before finding the correct one to press. A full 5 minutes goes by (and a total of 12 key strokes), which Douglas can see by the clock behind the secretary, before she finally notices him standing quietly next to her desk.
“Yes?”
“Ah, um, I’m here to see Mr Wright…”
She rolls her eyes, “…and?”
“I had an appointment… uh…”
“Your name, please?”
“Wensley, ah, Douglas Wensley…”
She sighs, digs around among the paperwork on the desk until she finds the document she’s looking for, scans through it with her finger, silently mouthing the words on the page, until, as last, locating the correct place, digs through the desk for a pen, and then precisely draws a circle on the page, furrowing her brow, and sticking her tongue out to the side while she does. Then she drops the pen, and the paper back onto the heap, and presses the button on a square box with a lattice across on side. There’s a crackled ‘beep’, and then a man’s voice says: “Yes?”.
“A Mister, um, Wesley? Here to see you, sir…”
“Send him in.”
The secretary looks up at Douglas, nods, and says, “go on in,” before returning to her hunting and pecking on the typing machine. Douglas heads over to the unmarked door, pulls it open, and steps into Mr Wright’s office.
