Flugamen—the L is silent

“Why are you standing in the rain?” asked the cop.

“Because I’m a character that’s part of a writing prompt contest,” said the bony man. I didn’t exist five minutes ago, and when folks are done reading this, I won’t exist again. But let me ask you a question—Officer Flugalmen—is it?"

“No, it’s Flugamen—the L is silent.”

“Well, that sounds like a bit of unnecessary exposition if you ask me,” said the bony man. But at any rate, what are you doing in my story?”

“What am I doing in your story? What makes you think this is your story? I’m a cop, doing my job, patrolling the streets. Maybe, it’s my story.”

“I don’t think so, Flugalmen. You wanna know why? Because I’ll bet you don’t even have a first name.”

“Of course I have a first name, you arrogant nit of a bony man.”

“Yeah, what is it?"

“It’s… Fred.”

“Fred? Fred Flugalmen? That’s the best you could come up with? Officer Fred Flugalmen?”

“I didn’t come up with it, he did."

“Who did?”

“The writer.”

“Oh, now you’ve gone and done it, Flugalmen. You just broke the fourth wall. But I’ll bet you don’t even know what the fourth wall is, do you, Flugalmen?"

After a pause…

“Is it the wall that comes right after the third wall?”

“Flugalmen, that’s a horrible line—you can’t keep it. Every editor in the world just vomited and went scrambling for a red pen.”

“Yeah, well, if you’re so smart, Mister Bony Man, what does my bad joke have to do with breaking the fourth wall?”

“Why do you keep calling me Bony man?”

“Now you’re losing the flow. I’ll get to that as soon as you answer my question,” said the cop.

“Okay, the thing of it is, Flugalmen, you just took the reader right out of the story. Now you’ve got her thinking maybe this isn’t a story at all—there is no rain, no me standing out in it, and no cop. Your joke is a scene killer.”

“Instead of empathy, Flugalmen, you’ve got the reader looking at her watch, or wondering what’s for lunch, or maybe regretting what she already had for lunch and why she overpaid, and in any case, she is no longer interested in where this is going.”

“You know what I think, Bony man? I think you’re just hell-bent on trying to interject some conflict.”

"I think you mean inject, Flugalmen."

"You're correcting me now, Bony man?"

“Stop calling me Bony man.”

“See, there you go, interjecting again, Bony man. So, I’m going to reiterate. What are you doing standing out in the middle of a rainstorm on 5th avenue in New York on a cold Wednesday morning on October 15th?"

“Flugalmen, you just shifted the point of view to you. Not only that, but you also tried to do it using some of the worst expository and on-the-nose dialogue ever before witnessed in the history of the written word. Do you think they care that it’s a cold Wednesday morning on October 15th and we’re standing here in the middle of a rainstorm on 5th avenue in New York City? You’ve got me repeating it, and how is that relevant?”

“I didn’t think about that. I’m sorry.”

“Oh, now that might work. A cop with a conscience. But why didn’t you say so in the beginning? See, you’ve just added a layer to your beat-cop, standing-in-the-rain, one-dimensional personality. Do you have a wife and kids, Fred?”

“You just called me Fred.”

“Answer the question.”

“Do you want me to have a wife and kids, Bony man?”

“It’s not what I want, Fred. It’s what he wants. But yes, I wish you had a wife and kids.”

“Well, that’s funny, because my wife’s name is Louise. We have a ten-year-old boy named Anthony, and a four-year-old girl named Sarah.”

“That’s nice, Flugalmen. But I have to tell you, I hate the name, Louise. I dated a Louise once, and she dropped me because I liked Italian food. She was weird that way. I think it was more about the spaghetti than the meatballs. Anyway, you can stop calling me Bony man, because I, too, have a name.”

“Yeah, what is it?

“It’s… Ignatius. Ignatius MacElroy.”

“That sounds like a Scottish grocery clerk. MacElroy, clean up on aisle seven.”

“Well, it’s a lot better than Fred Flugalmen.”

“I told you, it’s Flugamen—the L is silent. Why is that hard for you?”

“Flugalmen, how many words so far?”

“What? Maybe, seven hundred. Why does that matter?”

“Because it’s a short story, and I’m shooting for a thousand, and I just realized, it’s me, Ignatius MacElroy, standing here in a rainstorm, on a cold Wednesday morning, on Fifth Avenue in New York City, on October 15th of some undisclosed year, and well—this is a long sentence—but you’re Fred Flugalmen, with a silent L, and you’re a cop with a wife and a couple of kids, who asked me originally what I’m doing standing out here in the rain, and so far, that’s all the story is about.”

“I think that is a good use of summary.”

“Yes, but Fred, a story needs to have heart. This story needs to have heart. We need to make people care. They want to see growth, they want to see some change, and one of us, maybe both of us, needs to learn a life-changing lesson that will send them out into the world wanting to be better people.”

“Ignatius, I think that’s a load of crap.”

“Did you always feel that way?”

“What do you mean by always?”

“What I mean, Fred, what I’m asking, is that when you walked up to me, before you told me about your wife and your kids, did you always believe that people or characters needing to change in a story was a load of crap?”

“That is a wordy question, Ignatius, but no, I think I just came up with that,” said Fred.

“Well, then, see, there’s still hope for you, Fred.”

“What do you mean?"

“You can change, Fred. You can still be the good cop, with a wife named Louise—whose name I loathe—a son named Anthony, and a little girl named Sarah, all of whom probably love you very much. You can leave me alone and walk away in the rain this morning, go home tonight, hug your wife and kids, and tell them—Guys, I met this really weird guy named Ignatius MacElroy this morning. He was standing out in the rain, on Fifth Avenue, and why he was there, and where he was headed, I have no earthly idea.

But he made an impression on me, and I think I’m a better person for it.”