2023-09-11 Writing in 3D Excersize: Mall, Cooking Pot, Father and Son
#15 of Writer's Crossing
Writing in 3D is back on Writers' Crossing, and we kicked things off with a writing exercise! This was one where everyone offers up some concepts in a pile, then we sorta mix and match 'em, and write for fifteen or so minutes about what we got picked. The theme everyone had was transcribing a video tape.
The father's name was Bernard. The son's name was Gregory.
"Tacos, Gregory. Tacos and pizza," Bernard was saying.
"Right, okay." Gregory couldn't hold the camera steady to save his life, but he could vault the counters of the mall food court easily enough. He grabbed an entire frozen pizza out of the fridge of one place, and rather than leap back out, he scuttled between kitchen doors straight over to the taco joint, and gathered up a few hard shells and bags of meat, cheese, and lettuce. How he juggled the camera and all those ingredients, he'd taken a shopping basket from some store.
By the time Gregory returned to his dad, Bernard had the cooking pot lit up underneath on the portable grill. It was sizzling over with steam, and Bernard was twirling his implements about like a discount Teppenyaki chef.
"Let's sweeten the pot," Bernard said. "See that fried ice cream place? They were just becoming a chain. Grab me some of their taro sauce, if they have any left."
The crowd of hobos had gathered. They way they swayed from side to side in the darkness, getting a look into the cooking pot, made the footage a little unsettling to watch. Gregory returned with two big plastic cartons labeled "Taro".
"Now this," Bernard was explaining, "is our world-famous Mulligan stew. A little something for everybody. The secret's in all the spices." He cast a fistful of seasonings into the pot like some kind of wizard at his cauldron. Steam rose up. He grabbed the taro and concocted some sort of sauce from it that was dark and bubbly; it didn't transfer well to the screen, but given how the audience was enjoying it, he must've done something freaking magic to it, because they didn't object to what should have been an unorthodox melange of flavor. Or maybe they were just that hungry.
It was hard to make out faces other than the kid and his dad. So why was the kid recording this? They were going to get caught, eventually.
The tape went dark for a good several hours, but it wasn't off. The streetlights didn't transfer well somehow, but they were outside the mall, and then they were entering another entrance. They were carrying that cooking pot with them. The whole entourage clanged up the escalators, making a row. Singing like barbarians as they passed by clothing store after darkened clothing store.
Then I recognized where they were. They were heading here, to my office. They had the nerve to waltz right up to my office, recording their entire feat, and...
On the video, Gregory reached a fist out and rapped on the door.
The door to the room I was in. The room with all the monitors. With the VCR that had the tape I'd just been playing.
And the knocking came from both directions. From the TV, and from behind me.
My stomach began to rumble.