HOME | DD

Description
Lee Green gulped as he stared at the letter from his mentor. Horace Hill, the legendary author whose writing enamored him as early as his teens had never once spoken to him over the phone and never seen him face to face. In fact, his mentor had several times over the past two decades been thought to have died only to have yet another gripping tale enter the bestsellers list and captivate dozens of respectable journals with the possibility of an interview. He gave a smattering of them via letters over the years all sent from a post office box, but even detectives trying to pry into who owned the box couldn't find an answer, a different box used every year and a different person seen using it every few months. He was always at a distance like some taunting cat, keeping up an elusive persona that drove even his agent to several ulcers. Even she said that she didn't know what he looked like, or sounded like, but his writing had driven her to represent him regardless. There were a few details that Lee knew, that anyone obsessed with his career knew of course, but very little and none that could be proven. He claimed to walk with a limp in his left leg from a bullet wound sustained when he was younger, and had never once left the United States of America in his long life despite some of the details his writing had on locations across the globe. He was such a mystery that Lee hadn't even thought it possible that the author would receive the letter he had wrote to the man's agent a year ago, sending in his first manuscript along with an almost nauseatingly fawning request for any writing advice. Not only had he received the manuscript back filled with red marks and notation, but the sage author had requested that he not only not give up but that he send him more, seeing some potential in him, however small.

After a year of correspondence and Lee moving to a New York tenement, the two had gotten close in discussing other matters than just Lee's writing, but never anything so personal as to truly be able to call him a friend. A mentor, yes, but as Lee had put it in one letter, the two had never once met in person or talked on the phone. He regretted his words for almost a month as no reply was returned, thinking he had offended the elder author. What he received finally in the beginning of autumn, was even more terrifying and unconsidered. It had been dropped in his mail slot without any stamps upon the envelope, and had only one line on the folded sheet inside. It simply read,
"If you want to finally meet, come upstairs to 4B at 5 PM."

Lee held the letter in hand, shaking like a leaf in a hurricane as he stood outside 4B, pacing for a few minutes before the hour and chewing his fingernails until they almost bled. At precisely 5 o'clock, he reached out his hand to rap on the door, but a voice called out from inside.
"Come on in Lee, the door is unlocked." Lee shivered, feeling just as excited, just as terrified as when he had read his mentor's first published novel, 'The Monsters of Summer' and had become hooked on reading and writing for life. He pushed the door open slowly, hearing it creak, just like the steps in 'The Child Upstairs', just staring into the apartment without any idea of what he would see. There, sitting in an antique wingback chair that must have cost a fortune, was Horace Hill, in the liver-spot covered, wrinkled flesh. In his hands was a revolver, pointed upward, barrel against his nose. He smirked, gesturing to a more modest chair on the nearby kitchen tile, cocking the hammer of the gun back and pointing it at his pupil. "Shut the door behind you and take a seat Lee. We don't have very much time."

Lee sat in silence, gulping, fidgeting and trying to calm himself, opening his mouth to ask a question, but shutting it with fatal dread that he might say the wrong thing and set his mentor off as well as his trigger-finger. His mentor merely watched him for a while, pouring himself some coffee with one hand and drinking it black, the other keeping the gun trained on him. After finishing the cup, the armed author rubbed his brow.
"You know what your problem is, Lee? Not just with your syntax and grammar which we have dealt with as we exchanged letters, no, though that was horrid enough to read as it was. No, what's wrong is your voice, your writing, your life for fucksake! There's no bite to it! You're inspired by me, you want to be a professional like me, oh such heaps of bullshit you piled upon me!" The accusative finger pointed at Lee was firm and damning, the venom in the author's voice even more cutting than any blade, more a blow than even the bullet might be. "Still... Some of it is my fault I suppose. After all, I knew what I was getting into when I wrote back to you. I saw it all, even your vapid nonsense about not truly feeling you were my friend. You little pissant, you haven't any real friends in the world, none that understand you like I do. I've stood in your pathetic shoes, I've seen what you've seen. But I've grown out of it while you've just been a lazy bastard! No, don't you dare fucking speak. Don't you dare try to make some fucking objection you pukestain. I needed a push to get my own voice and so do you. You know what got me started? Huh? Such a big fan, surely you remember what the few interviews said, don't you?" Horace Hill was spiting out the words with such force that Lee felt a compulsion to wipe his face clean even across the distance, though in his fear he could barely try to stutter a reply, let alone move his hands off his knees. The gunshot that followed was so unexpected that Lee thought he was dead before the pain kicked in.

"Go on! Yes! Scream out all that pent up rage!" Horace laughed and kicked Lee's side, dropping the revolver into his seat as he rose up from it. Lee writhed on the floor, his screams not in rage but pain and disbelief, his hands clutching the wound that had gone straight through his left vastus lateralis, the muscle of his leg bleeding and tightening around the wound. His mentor started heating up a spatula on the stove while Lee tried not to pass out, fearing he would be summarily dealt with like the grandfather in his mentor's 'The Gravestones are Falling', chopped up and fed to the stray cats in the alley over a few months.
"You... Fucking psychopath! You shot me!" Lee managed to pant out, wondering why, why, why. Why had he been shot? Why had his mentor been upstairs? Why had his mentor told him to come upstairs when he knew where he lived if only to shoot him? More importantly, why wasn't he hearing any sirens or thudding of police racing up the stairs in the tenement too old to have an elevator? After all, the nearest station was just across the street and certainly someone had heard the gunshot, right?
"You think?! Gee! And here I thought I missed. Don't worry about the noise, I had all the rooms soundproofed except yours when I bought the building. Scream it out, don't hold it in. This is going to hurt again." Horace Hill said before pressing the red hot metal against Lee's wounds and pants, pouring alcohol over both. Lee's anguish intensified and he screamed until his breath gave out. His mentor lifted him up and he could barely hear Horace Hill speak as his mind fuzzed, starting to pass out. "You always wanted to be a better writer? To be like me? Well, dimwit, here's your chance." His vision blurred but he saw the sun setting outside as his mentor set him against the outer wall, glancing back at a clock on the wall before nodding to himself, mumbling. Seconds, minutes, hours, Lee didn't know how much time had passed between closing his eyes and opening them again, but the next thing he saw was the dumpster underneath the window as he rushed to meet it.

Groaning, Lee pulled himself out of the dumpster, wincing and whimpering in pain as he put pressure on his injured leg, looking back up at the tenement window he had been thrown out of. He half expected Horace Hill's face to be looking back at him, either spitting or laughing, but instead he saw only the brownstone and clouds. Shaking his head, trying to clear it, he limped out of the alley, intent on reporting his mentor to the police. He looked both ways, surprised at seeing a cherry Arrest-Me Red Porsche 959 parked in front of his building, but was even more astounded when he looked across the street. Expecting to see the police station, instead he was greeted by a derelict brownstone in much the same design as the one he lived in. He gaped, rubbing his eyes, looking up at the still setting sun, then at a newspaper box that he swore had been closer to the street corner when last he noticed it, not that he really read the newspaper much when everything was online. He moved to it cautiously, feeling his pockets for change before even looking at the front, blinking as he felt that not only was his wallet still there, but it felt thicker than before. He pulled it out in a daze, looking back at his building to make sure his mentor hadn't come down to torment him further, fumbling it and dropping the wallet on the pavement. When he picked it back up he stared for a moment, pale as he saw not his almost expired license, but another with his face still staring back at him, though everything else was different. In disbelief he looked at the newspaper box again, rushing to its front, reading the headline and almost fainting. The headline read 'Challenge shuttle explodes, killing all 7 members'. Lee pulled at his hair, his look of horror evident as he turned from it, realization settling in as he stuffed the wallet back into his pocket and ran toward the nearest bank to open an account. For the wallet contained not only ten thousand dollars in a mint band, but the New York Driver's License with his face on it containing different information than his old one. Most disparagingly different, the name: Horace Hill.

Description
Lee Green gulped as he stared at the letter from his mentor. Horace Hill, the legendary author whose writing enamored him as early as his teens had never once spoken to him over the phone and never seen him face to face. In fact, his mentor had several times over the past two decades been thought to have died only to have yet another gripping tale enter the bestsellers list and captivate dozens of respectable journals with the possibility of an interview. He gave a smattering of them via letters over the years all sent from a post office box, but even detectives trying to pry into who owned the box couldn't find an answer, a different box used every year and a different person seen using it every few months. He was always at a distance like some taunting cat, keeping up an elusive persona that drove even his agent to several ulcers. Even she said that she didn't know what he looked like, or sounded like, but his writing had driven her to represent him regardless. There were a few details that Lee knew, that anyone obsessed with his career knew of course, but very little and none that could be proven. He claimed to walk with a limp in his left leg from a bullet wound sustained when he was younger, and had never once left the United States of America in his long life despite some of the details his writing had on locations across the globe. He was such a mystery that Lee hadn't even thought it possible that the author would receive the letter he had wrote to the man's agent a year ago, sending in his first manuscript along with an almost nauseatingly fawning request for any writing advice. Not only had he received the manuscript back filled with red marks and notation, but the sage author had requested that he not only not give up but that he send him more, seeing some potential in him, however small.

After a year of correspondence and Lee moving to a New York tenement, the two had gotten close in discussing other matters than just Lee's writing, but never anything so personal as to truly be able to call him a friend. A mentor, yes, but as Lee had put it in one letter, the two had never once met in person or talked on the phone. He regretted his words for almost a month as no reply was returned, thinking he had offended the elder author. What he received finally in the beginning of autumn, was even more terrifying and unconsidered. It had been dropped in his mail slot without any stamps upon the envelope, and had only one line on the folded sheet inside. It simply read,
"If you want to finally meet, come upstairs to 4B at 5 PM."

Lee held the letter in hand, shaking like a leaf in a hurricane as he stood outside 4B, pacing for a few minutes before the hour and chewing his fingernails until they almost bled. At precisely 5 o'clock, he reached out his hand to rap on the door, but a voice called out from inside.
"Come on in Lee, the door is unlocked." Lee shivered, feeling just as excited, just as terrified as when he had read his mentor's first published novel, 'The Monsters of Summer' and had become hooked on reading and writing for life. He pushed the door open slowly, hearing it creak, just like the steps in 'The Child Upstairs', just staring into the apartment without any idea of what he would see. There, sitting in an antique wingback chair that must have cost a fortune, was Horace Hill, in the liver-spot covered, wrinkled flesh. In his hands was a revolver, pointed upward, barrel against his nose. He smirked, gesturing to a more modest chair on the nearby kitchen tile, cocking the hammer of the gun back and pointing it at his pupil. "Shut the door behind you and take a seat Lee. We don't have very much time."

Lee sat in silence, gulping, fidgeting and trying to calm himself, opening his mouth to ask a question, but shutting it with fatal dread that he might say the wrong thing and set his mentor off as well as his trigger-finger. His mentor merely watched him for a while, pouring himself some coffee with one hand and drinking it black, the other keeping the gun trained on him. After finishing the cup, the armed author rubbed his brow.
"You know what your problem is, Lee? Not just with your syntax and grammar which we have dealt with as we exchanged letters, no, though that was horrid enough to read as it was. No, what's wrong is your voice, your writing, your life for fucksake! There's no bite to it! You're inspired by me, you want to be a professional like me, oh such heaps of bullshit you piled upon me!" The accusative finger pointed at Lee was firm and damning, the venom in the author's voice even more cutting than any blade, more a blow than even the bullet might be. "Still... Some of it is my fault I suppose. After all, I knew what I was getting into when I wrote back to you. I saw it all, even your vapid nonsense about not truly feeling you were my friend. You little pissant, you haven't any real friends in the world, none that understand you like I do. I've stood in your pathetic shoes, I've seen what you've seen. But I've grown out of it while you've just been a lazy bastard! No, don't you dare fucking speak. Don't you dare try to make some fucking objection you pukestain. I needed a push to get my own voice and so do you. You know what got me started? Huh? Such a big fan, surely you remember what the few interviews said, don't you?" Horace Hill was spiting out the words with such force that Lee felt a compulsion to wipe his face clean even across the distance, though in his fear he could barely try to stutter a reply, let alone move his hands off his knees. The gunshot that followed was so unexpected that Lee thought he was dead before the pain kicked in.

"Go on! Yes! Scream out all that pent up rage!" Horace laughed and kicked Lee's side, dropping the revolver into his seat as he rose up from it. Lee writhed on the floor, his screams not in rage but pain and disbelief, his hands clutching the wound that had gone straight through his left vastus lateralis, the muscle of his leg bleeding and tightening around the wound. His mentor started heating up a spatula on the stove while Lee tried not to pass out, fearing he would be summarily dealt with like the grandfather in his mentor's 'The Gravestones are Falling', chopped up and fed to the stray cats in the alley over a few months.
"You... Fucking psychopath! You shot me!" Lee managed to pant out, wondering why, why, why. Why had he been shot? Why had his mentor been upstairs? Why had his mentor told him to come upstairs when he knew where he lived if only to shoot him? More importantly, why wasn't he hearing any sirens or thudding of police racing up the stairs in the tenement too old to have an elevator? After all, the nearest station was just across the street and certainly someone had heard the gunshot, right?
"You think?! Gee! And here I thought I missed. Don't worry about the noise, I had all the rooms soundproofed except yours when I bought the building. Scream it out, don't hold it in. This is going to hurt again." Horace Hill said before pressing the red hot metal against Lee's wounds and pants, pouring alcohol over both. Lee's anguish intensified and he screamed until his breath gave out. His mentor lifted him up and he could barely hear Horace Hill speak as his mind fuzzed, starting to pass out. "You always wanted to be a better writer? To be like me? Well, dimwit, here's your chance." His vision blurred but he saw the sun setting outside as his mentor set him against the outer wall, glancing back at a clock on the wall before nodding to himself, mumbling. Seconds, minutes, hours, Lee didn't know how much time had passed between closing his eyes and opening them again, but the next thing he saw was the dumpster underneath the window as he rushed to meet it.

Groaning, Lee pulled himself out of the dumpster, wincing and whimpering in pain as he put pressure on his injured leg, looking back up at the tenement window he had been thrown out of. He half expected Horace Hill's face to be looking back at him, either spitting or laughing, but instead he saw only the brownstone and clouds. Shaking his head, trying to clear it, he limped out of the alley, intent on reporting his mentor to the police. He looked both ways, surprised at seeing a cherry Arrest-Me Red Porsche 959 parked in front of his building, but was even more astounded when he looked across the street. Expecting to see the police station, instead he was greeted by a derelict brownstone in much the same design as the one he lived in. He gaped, rubbing his eyes, looking up at the still setting sun, then at a newspaper box that he swore had been closer to the street corner when last he noticed it, not that he really read the newspaper much when everything was online. He moved to it cautiously, feeling his pockets for change before even looking at the front, blinking as he felt that not only was his wallet still there, but it felt thicker than before. He pulled it out in a daze, looking back at his building to make sure his mentor hadn't come down to torment him further, fumbling it and dropping the wallet on the pavement. When he picked it back up he stared for a moment, pale as he saw not his almost expired license, but another with his face still staring back at him, though everything else was different. In disbelief he looked at the newspaper box again, rushing to its front, reading the headline and almost fainting. The headline read 'Challenge shuttle explodes, killing all 7 members'. Lee pulled at his hair, his look of horror evident as he turned from it, realization settling in as he stuffed the wallet back into his pocket and ran toward the nearest bank to open an account. For the wallet contained not only ten thousand dollars in a mint band, but the New York Driver's License with his face on it containing different information than his old one. Most disparagingly different, the name: Horace Hill.