SOME PEOPLE - Brad Petit

Pulses ribbons tonal cues shimmering forward and backwards, like a spewing slot machine or a fountain being played in reverse. Those were the boss’s exact instructions. Exactly as the customer had told it to her, according to her at least. You’ll know what to do, she said to me. Like you always do. I sat there and coughed, nodded. What is the core objective of this one? The boss may have been just as baffled but didn’t want to project it, didn’t want to disrupt the careful architecture of it all. Listen, she offered. Sell the sizzle. She tapped the roll of papers against the door-frame in a syncopated waltz. Maybe? Remember your Schubert. I said thanks, that helps. I called my wife as soon as she left. Honey, I said. I told her everything. I could hear her workplace in the background as I spoke, the din of it ongoing, inexhaustible. I finished and the line fell quiet. Some people, she said. It took me most of the afternoon to settle on the instrumentation. That was always the most elusive part: getting the overall palette just right. It ran through the shadows in the back of my head. Get back here. Get back here you Jack Nastyface. After that the specifics hardly mattered. I probably grabbed an old sketch off my scrap pile, re-read it and pulled out some of my favorite things, and finished the job. What do you call it, the boss said. The Song of the Nareids. Simulacrum of Salad Days. I don’t know. Tell them anything. Tell them I’m tired now and I think I’ll go home.

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Brad Petit was born in the nation’s capital exactly 212 years after the death of Crispus Attucks. You might recognize his writing from The Broadkill Review, Dark Horses, the Raleigh News & Observer, or elsewhere. You can @ him at @bradjpet. He lives in South Carolina with his wife and son.