Motivations were next on the table. Characters need motivation to move, just as we are moved to write. There were options, but I chose this. I think I began to enjoy myself as I wrote this, again within a 10-15 minute time frame.
the piece:
The thunderous roar of those dread machines was enough to make Mary Jane flinch. It’s a full moon tonight, she thought. Must be one from the Gulf that time. It wasn’t her unsteady hands that shook the coffee out of the pot, but the 18 wheels of masculinity that passed the diner. Nights brought out these creatures, as drivers sought to take advantage of lighter traffic and get the most mileage from the permissible 8 hour shifts.
No-one in LA was a waitress, nor a valet attendant, bouncer, cook; at least, no-one was ever only thus. LA was where she was headed, the end point of a crooked line that snaked back all the way to Bam Bam, Alabama. She hadn’t made it, though. The diner was thirty seven miles south east of the very out-skirts of Los Angeles, the City of Angels, on the intersection of I-110 and Route 5.
She yearned to sing, to dance, to become the best Elvis impersonator that ever was. Never mind that hip surgery had slightly stifled her version of the King’s shuffle, nor that she had been stuck these 37 miles from Hollywood for as long as she could remember. She devised ways to keep song and dance in her life. It had taken some months, but she finally cajoled the owner to submission; henceforth, in place of her dancing feet, she captured rhythm in the menu:
If you’re hungry and in a hurry
Try our spicy, Mexican curry
She would recite the day’s specials with much relish and such polished professionalism that her regulars would beam with pride:
Canines are Man’s best friend
We don’t eat them, you understand
Try it today, our famous hot dog
before you hit LA smog
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