Trystan

I give to you a story in eleventy-one words

hey man. that’s what Trystan wrote. after twenty years. the person to whom he wrote, Bill, wrote howdy in return. a careful choice. ‘hi’ seemed too curt. ‘hey’ felt like parroting. ‘what’s up’ asked a question he didn’t want answered. ‘howdy’ has a playful lilt, an unassuming gesticulatory quality sans handiness.

how’ve you been? the dreaded ‘how are you’ conjugated into the present perfect with a dollop of nostalgia to make it seem like he cared. (he didn’t). doin well, wrote the cautious Bill; he courageously fought the urge to add, ‘and you.’

thats good. an unapostrophed response that can spell the death knell of a chat. or so Bill hoped. 

Pronounced the British Way

they found a cab and, eventually, their way to the west village which you might guess is the village next to east village, or central village (which doesn’t exist) but which is really next to greenwich (pronounced the british way) village. this was after the cab driver took them by some meandering route of which Chris was not particularly fond. Chris’ mixture of passive aggressive and regular aggressive commentary encouraged the cab driver to meander even more. and thus, they arrived in the west village via what might be abbreviated as sovi if south village existed (but it doesn’t). instead, they arrived via soho, south of houston (pronounced the british way).