Hardy Laughter

The door slammed shut with a loud bang, making Gary jump in his chair. Across the desk, Grayson seemed unmoved, as if this sort of thing happened all the time. He continued to scan the document before him. Eventually he said, "Door stop must have slipped. It's the new carpet. Still too slick."

Gary nodded, although Grayson was still looking down at the doc.

An office with a desk, two chairs in front, one in back. Bookshelves and filing cabinets, degrees and accolades in frames on the walls, a window with a parking lot view. Fluorescent lighting. That new carpet smell.

Grayson looked up. He gazed at Gary for the moment that it took his brain to shift from looking-at-paper to looking-at-person. Gary swallowed, his Adam's apple in high contrast, casting a shadow from light through the window, a visible rise and fall. Grayson said, "So let me get this straight."

"Yes," Gary said.

"This is a story about a guy who is writing a novel."

"Right."

"And the novel is about a guy who wants to remake 'Summer Breeze' by Seals and Croft."

"Yes."

"He thinks the lyrics are all wrong for the key, chord progression, and overall tone of the..." Grayson peered down at the manuscript, leafed a few pages, "musicality. Of the song"

"Right. He thinks that the lyrics should be a bit more ominous. In the first third, he'll try explicating the original lyrics for more sinister meaning, but that will ultimately fail."

"Okay. I think I see where this is going. And in the story, not the novel, the novel gets optioned for a film?"

"That's right. A studio exec thinks it would make a good action-adventure flick, a vehicle for an up-and-comer."

"Action adventure? For a novel about a guy re-making a song from the 70s?"

"It adds to the irony."

"And who were you thinking we'd get for the studio exec?"

"Jeremy Piven."

"I don't think we can get Jeremy Piven."

"Well, we don't have to---it's a story. It's not real."

"Oh, right. Okay. But... okay, I'm a little confused."

"Go ahead."

"In the story, not the novel, you have a guy called "Grayson."

"Yes."

"That's me."

"Right."

"No, I mean, I am Grayson. Right now. In this story."

"Yes! And I'm Gary."

"So we're in this story that's about this guy who is writing a novel about a guy who wants to remake Summer Breeze."

"Yep!"

"And then what."

Gary shrugs. "I don't know. That's why I brought it you."

"You see, there's problems."

"I know. That's why. I brought it. To you."

"I mean, so far, there hasn't been a novel. Just two guys in an office talking about the story they're in. One of them says 'this is a story about a guy writing a novel.' But so far, it isn't!"

"I need help, Grayson, is what I'm saying."

"Did you bring this to me so I would write the novel?"

"No. There's no novel. Just a story about a guy who's writing a novel."

"Well, so far, it's a story about two guys discussing the story they're in, which one of them says at first that's it a story about a guy writing a novel, but the more a person reads this, the less likely there's going to be a novel at all, or a story about it."

"Here's the thing, Gray. Can I call you Gray?"

"It's a respelling of 'Gary,' isn't it?"

"Coincidence. You see, when-"

"Pretty fucking weird coincidence, Gary."

"We'll come back to that. Now listen. When a writer says something, it is. And so when he says something is about something, both are, even if one isn't. So, when you said that this story is about a guy writing a novel, for the reader, there's now a novel. The reader can imagine this novel. The reader can imagine a character trying to rewrite Summer Breeze. But, and here's the thing, Gray, you and I can't."

Grayson stared at Gary for the moment it took his brain to switch from thinking-he-existed to realizing-he-didn't.

"Every story is unreliable. Every story has a narrator, even if it's a non-person 'voice,' a kind of meta-being made out of the act of reading. The reader is the voice. The reader is the narrator. The narrator is unreliable because he constructs realities that even he isn't a part of. And therefore-"

"Every story means everything."

"Right."

"So. The problem. You're having. Is. Is the guy. In the novel. The first third. He tries to explicate the song. To show that it's actually sinister. And he fails. But he shouldn't have. Because in the context of language as a meta-intelligent construct that defines itself, just by saying that Summer Breeze is sinister, it is. And it is in the novel, which doesn't exist for you or me, because we're in the story, but exists for the reader of this story.

"No! That's my problem! Gray! Language allows anything to be anything. But in this story about a story about a guy writing a novel, the song Summer Breeze fails to be sinister in its present state. And so it isn't. In the novel. Even though it is, in the story. But not for you or me. But it is for the person reading this story right now."

Gary sat back in his seat, sweat on his brow. Grayson sat back in his chair, also sweating visibly. He punched a button on his phone. "Stereotypical Secretary, two vodka tonics please," he said at the phone.

"Go fuck yourself," the phone replied back.

Grayson stood up, walked to the book case where a previously unmentioned shelf held a few liquor bottles and some glasses. He made two vodka tonics, handed one to Gary, then took his seat again. They both sipped. You could say they sipped as one.

"So what do we do?" Gary finally managed.

Grayson nodded a few times. In a way, he sort of looked like Jeremy Piven. He chewed iced with his mouth open, gazing, then staring, then glaring at Gary. Gary swallowed again, shadow on his Adam's apple in the same place, since time in the office hadn't moved forward at all.

Finally Grayson shrugged. "Fuck 'em."

"Who?"

"The reader. Arrogant shits will just think this is clever. They may not even like it. But we got nothing to worry about."

"How do you figure."

Grayson spinned around in his chair a few times. "The writer thinks he's a real person, and not someone in a story, right?

"Yeah..."

"So will the readers. They'll think they're real, not someone in a story. So fuck 'em."

Gary stared wide-eyed at nothing for a few moments. He blinked a few times. Then he grinned, and looking at Grayson, said "What if no one ever reads it, though?"

They both burst into hardy laughter.