The Fourth

As mortars and M80s cracked their sonic whips in the miles of city stretching from border to border, people celebrated whatever they felt like. An excuse to get wasted and party for some, celebrating freedom for others, and a lousy holiday that kept the rest up all night. Mr. Brown, sitting in the driver seat of his ’89 POS, had different thoughts on his mind.

Thinking back to a few days prior he remembered coming into work late so that he could spend a few extra minutes at home making breakfast-in-bed for his sick wife. It was the last time he’d ever be late to work as a bartender.

Unemployed, he got into his car, started the rundown engine, and chug-chugged along home with an empty wallet and a full brain. The thoughts of unemployed men with wives to feed are full of many things, namely swearing, along with screams of frustration. How would Mrs. Brown take it?

He pushed the key into the lock and stepped into the warm climate of a home without air conditioning in the summer months. All he wanted was to get a cold brew from the refrigerator, lie down next to his wife, and sip it while listening to her faint breaths. One of three worked out.

Beer in hand and depression in tow, he walked down the hallway and pushed the door to his bedroom open. Crushing the beer can in his fist—beer spilling over it and onto the carpet—he retreated backward and rushed to his car to escape the scene that lay before him.

It was the Fourth of fuckin’ July now. Explosions sounded from all directions, people fired pistols into the air, kids drank themselves to death, and dogs barked and cowered in fear. None of it mattered to Mr. Brown, the man without a job or wife. His wife, the angel that he got fired for, turned out to be a cunt. Hands on her chest, rubbing her nipples and her sides, moving her in rhythm. Her voice crying out in waves of pleasure as she got fucked by some dumbfuck with an ingrown toenail.

The car door opened and he stepped out, an old double-barreled friend of his from long ago in his hand. Fireworks continued to go off as he walked casually to the door and kicked it open. She never even screamed, at least that’s what neighbors said, the same neighbors who claimed to have heard nothing more than a few M80 explosions from the Brown household.

Investigators found a woman resembling red swiss-cheese in a pile on the floor, sheets wrapped around her naked form. Another man lay on the other side of the bed, a pool of blood covering nearly the entire floor of the room. His head was a pile of brain and bone near the nightstand.

As for Mr. Brown, he came away from the entire incident with nothing more than a hole the size of a basketball in the back of his head and a shotgun barrel in his mouth. He and the others were found when a peeping tom saw a crack in the curtains and hoped to jack off to a voyeuristic fucking. What he found was even better, and he came twice before alerting the police. It was the best Fourth of July of his life.

As for Mr. Brown, he came away from the entire incident with nothing more than a hole the size of a basketball in the back of his head and a shotgun barrel in his mouth.

seems unlikely a shot in the mouth would leave "a hole the size of a basketball" anywhere. But I don't know much about guns, so what can I say?

Some of your sentences were too long for my taste, and over all the writing felt cramped. You told so much, and showed...nothing. Everything you mentioned could have been done through a real scene, rather than a brief synopsis of what was happening; doing so makes your writing more affective. Turns this:

His wife, the angel that he got fired for, turned out to be a cunt. Hands on her chest, rubbing her nipples and her sides, moving her in rhythm. Her voice crying out in waves of pleasure as she got fucked by some dumbfuck with an ingrown toenail.

Into something like this: (I'll be short)

"What the fuck are you doing?" he shouted. His wife barely noticed that he was even in the room, too busy growling in ecstasy as the man behind her vigerously moved in and out.

Like I said, short. But you can easily see from it that it gives room for more details.

Also, your characters were nothing more than words. Flat, flat, flat. Creating scenes will help create actual, live characters. You don't want to tell a story, you want us to believe it happened/is happening.

And as for the, what should I call it, perversion? To an extent, it seemed like you added it in for the hell of it. Like the bit at the end about the perv going off to the scene of dead people? That seemed to me like you wrote it solely for shock factor. And if you are going to write something of this nature, there should be more behind it than shock factor. Are you writing erotica? (or like me) Do you like to play around with the taboo? Don't be vulgar just because you can, gives us a reason for the vulgarity.

Hope this helped.

Thanks for the feedback.

You say I tell a lot and show nothing, but that was my intent. I wanted to make the story completely disconnected and emotionless. As for the flat characters, their flatness is what added to their dimension.

Guns have bigger exit wounds than you would expect.

The perversion was meant to not only challenge taboos, but to also show the disgusting nature of humans and their love for the tragic.


Maybe you would enjoy Numb more.

. . .Intense

That was the word that popped into my head after reading your piece, never read anything like it.

I love the opening line. And "chug-chugged along home with an empty wallet and a full brain."

The bareness of the descriptions of your characters added to that aspect that these people could be anyone, that this situation could happen anywhere, hell, even across the road or down the street from where you're living.

This sort of thing is common, and in this case and the cases in reality this situation is often ironic. Man works hard, long hours to support sweet, loving wife. Wife sleeps with others behind his back without him knowing AND manages to make him feel guilty when he loses his job. . . I don't want to sound chauvinistic, it also happens the other way around as well.

Your piece definetly shows how all individuals of our modern society are not apple pie perfect and that there are some issues that aren't in the news very much, but it is very much happening all around us, which are testy issues that most cower away from.

It was sick and depraved, but some people need to be shown that other side, need to be shown that the scenarios that occur in our society are not all peaches and cream.

I can't quite relate because the US is quite different from Canada, with the availability of guns and all that, plus we don't celebrate the fourth.

PS: I think you should put a rating on this, what if some 13 year old reads this? I know some 13 year olds are are not as sweet & innocent as your regular 13 year old, but take it into consideration.

Thanks for your feedback. You perceived it how I intended, and for that I am grateful. I greatly appreciate your comments.

Note: It has an R rating. Not sure if it didn't show up for you or what.