Narrator candidate identified, commencing evaluation.
She wasn’t pretty. I don’t even remember first seeing her. She was small. She had, as my friends told me, great big tits, though I really didn’t care. It was spring in the Midwest, I was a sucker for skirts and cleavage and wide smiles. I was also a sucker for adventure after a nasty break-up and six months of post-college nothing. I didn’t like that this made me a “dude,” but then maybe I did. It’s never a good idea to get involved with someone in your office, but that taboo-ness was a hint of what I needed. She taught me how to fuck when I didn’t want to learn anything else. She was the perfect girl for the wrong time of my life.
She was brazen. When she was sober, it was intoxicating; when she was drunk, it was nauseating. After my boss fired her because she wasn’t as skilled as me at calling off sick, I got to see her in her element at the department store. I wondered if we’d have sex in the changing rooms, or if we’d even make it that far considering the density of all the racks and turnstiles covered with clothing. We might duck below them right here, on lunch break. My friend Billy warned me over pasta and breadsticks at some chain restaurant to stay away from girls with fucked up childhoods, but I didn’t see how she had a fucked up childhood. Or maybe he said don’t fall in with stupid people, but Billy was an elitist and this was the beginning of our estrangement. He told me I should leave the state. Nothing was keeping me. A year was enough. Move on.
Narrator lacks focus. No grounding in time or place. Losing us. Theoretical framework unclear. Questionable erotic value despite potential readership. […]
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Scott Lambridis work has appeared in The Chicago Review, Slice, Memorious, Cafe Irreal, and other journals. Scott’s first novel received the 2012 Dana Award, and is represented by Katherine Boyle of Veritas Literary Agency. A MFA graduate from San Francisco State, Scott received the Miriam Ylvisaker Fellowship and three literary awards. Before that, Lambridis earned a degree in neurobiology, and co-founded Omnibucket.com, in addition to co-hosting the Action Fiction! performance series. Read more at scottlambridis.com.