Today I discovered a real disadvantage associated with the writing of suspense and thrillers. While contemplating the rewrite of a scene where Catherine Combes is indecisive about pulling her weapon on a seventeen-year-old girl, the silence in my office was shattered by exploding glass.
A UFO (Unwanted Flying Object) had breached the outer layer of insulated glass but, fortunately, didn’t carry enough momentum to penetrate the inner pane. A bird? I looked for forensic evidence. The screen hadn’t been damaged, making a bird strike unlikely. No sign of blood feathers or slimy white poo… A slight motion in my peripheral vision caught my attention. If it was a friggin’ alien spaceship, it was a tiny one. No worries about fifty-foot irradiated women, or big laser-blasting tripods here. The object was perfectly round, rolling to a stop in my neighbor’s grass.
A quick glance out my window to the street below assured me that there were no snipers, gangstas, or hideous horrible creatures about. I cautiously ventured down my stairs and out my front door.
I approached the object on tiptoes and from a dozen feet away saw that the side of the object was adorned with characters. My instincts told me to drop to the ground and crawl toward it on my hands and knees, but our neighborhood has a block party every summer, and I had no intention of being the topic of conversation for the length of the party.
I remained standing, like a man… and stepped firmly forward. A few feet away, I was close enough to decipher the heiroglyphic impressions…
M… a… x… f… l… i… 1!
ttfn, rlc