Abandoning a Questionably Bright Future

[Strichev]

Feedback: http://discoverygc.com/forums/showthread.php?tid=97370

//This is more of a character psychology and dialogue writing exercise than a real attempt at a story. It is to become my first text of larger proportions written in English. Please keep that in mind and in case of a very obnoxious mistake being repeated inform me about it, as I’m more than happy to gain new knowledge. Feel free to use the feedback thread to state whatever may come to your mind. (Ok, ok, I know that stores written by non-native speakers can be, and in most cases are, a pain to read. Because of that I’m not expecting any feedback.)

The narrator is a young, rather troubled (or so he thinks) individual who seeks to find his place in the world that is presented from his, at times very subjective viewpoint. Consequently in many cases profanity is used. Nothing too serious though. Hyper sensitive individuals should avoid reading this. In fact stories written in first person go on my own nerves, so…I wouldn’t read this if it was written by someone else…

Also, asterisk FTW.

Abandoning a Questionably Bright Future

I didn't have much of a remarkable life before. Nothing to write about. My mother was – is – a teacher in one of those goddamn primary schools on the good ol’ Planet Los Angeles. My father, if you really wanna know, keeps the lane rings bright and shiny, so that all that space junk can keep buzzing around. He’s a sort of a mini boss there. Both must be pretty damn run down now when I’m gone. You see, I’m their only son. It’s not that I care about them being worried. Or perhaps I do. They were always nice and caring and that. Now when I think about it they did one hellova job bringing me up. That’s why I hadn’t just disappeared.

Anyway, I’m not going to tell you my whole goddamn biography, why should I? No one wants to listen to that kind of crap. What I am going to talk about is how I got from an almost top of the class, well-behaved, clear-thinking, future intellectual (that’s the bullshit the teachers used to fill our heads with) to the lowest of space rats. When I think about it, I’ve always been a total space case. It has only gotten to me this year though.

It was mid-March when I got my flying licence. That’s supposed to be a big deal around those parts. You have to putter around in a rusty old shuttle along with an instructor. It takes ages. The good thing is, I was really, really lucky. I got to fly around with a rather normal guy that kept biting and cleaning his nails in mid-flight. He would just spit the bitten off nail on the floor. Imagine what happened in zero-g, when all that shit began floating around the cockpit. Thank god, if there is one, for helmets. It kept him from biting his whole goddamn fingers off in zero g. I’ve passed the test. The Dracula – that’s how folk used to call the guy in the commission – didn’t even bother scrutinising my flying much. Surprising I must say. Rumour has it that the dreaded Dracula drinks people’s blood on the test quite often. I got to skip a maths test in school because of all that shit. But what I did do, the day I passed the test, was to get right back in the damned school. Totally nerdy, I know. My friends must have been quite jelly about me getting the licence, although they were smiling and stuff. You see, I was the first to hit eighteen in the class. I guess everyone is jelly at least once, even those saint-like individuals. As is the habit we went out for a drink that day. Orca Bar. I dished out cash like a fucking millionaire; I’m not the tight-fisted type. Well, for the most part. Whiskey with ice did help in that matter. Drinking it made me feel sort of badass, if you know what I mean. Just like what I’m drinking now. When you’re eighteen most people mix those alcoholic beverages with all sorts of sweet juices. Not me though. The thing was that those bastards in the bar kept deluding the booze with water. Not that I noticed that then. Nowadays I would, but then…