Saturday, December 2

Click Clack Snap


This is a work of fiction. Copyright © 2006 Rumba Creative. All Rights Reserved.
No portion of this work may be copied, retransmitted, reposted, duplicated,
or otherwise used without the express written approval of the author.


Click Clack Snap


“How come you never have what I want?” Click.

“How do I know what you need?” Clack.

“You never have enough blue ones.” Snap.

“Don’t blame me. I was bought this way. Maybe you should think harder.” Click-snap.

Stupid bricks. When I need a two-by-two, there’s only four-by-twos. When I need the triangle piece, all he gives me is a twelve-by-one, or a wheel. Dumb toy. The pieces never fit right. I want to stop playing, but I can’t.

“Do you have a small yellow brick?”

“You’re the one using me. Look for yourself.”

“I hate you.”

“You hate me because you aren’t smart enough to make me anything but a house.”

“Nuh-uh!”

“Yuh-huh! Look! What shape am I?”

I look. Rectangular base. Overlapping white brick walls. Clear two-by-ones like a window. The other pieces are jumbled up in little plastic boxes. Half of them are roof pieces. The rest are colors or shapes of bricks I can’t figure out how to use.

“See?” His voice makes fun of me, like every time. “I’m gonna be a house again.”

“Not this time. You always make me make you into a house. I’m not gonna use the door pieces, or the window pieces, or the tree pieces, or the little car.” Smashety-clack.

“Why are you undoing me?” Unsnap.

“You know you won’t me make me into anything good.” Brokety-toss.

“Now I’m just a big pile of dog doo. You’ll never make me into anything good.” I don’t talk. He made me mad. I’ll show him.

“What are you doing?” Click.

“What is this?” Clack.

“Are you done yet?” Snap snap. Done.

“What am I?”

“You’re an airport tower. See how tall you are? These stick out pieces are the warning lights. The top goes over the clouds so airplanes can see you.” I turn him around and around. For a while there is no rattling sound of plastic pieces being raked up.

“I look stupid.”

My mad makes me mad. He can’t beat me again! This time he will be most perfectest neatest thing ever!

Click snap clackety snap snap click clack snappety whomp!

“Wow. Look what you did.” Triumphant, I hold him in my hands. My disappointment and anger drip through my fingers.

He’s a house. Another stupid dumb poopy house.

“Don’t give up!” he says. “Look! This time you made the walls different colors! And the door is on the side! And the window looks into the basement! And the garage is on the roof! And you put the tree inside! Very creative! Good job!”

I turn him around and around again. It’s not like any of the other stuff we ever made. It might be a house, but it’s a DIFFERENT house. It looks good.

I hear Mom calling me for dinner.

“I gotta go,” I say, knowing I won at last.

“Okay. Thanks for playing with me. You did great!” I open my bedroom door to leave.

“Randy?”

“What?”

“I’m still a house.”

Clackety-GRRR.

13 comments:

rennratt said...

If my legos talked to ME like that, I would run over them with a tonka truck.

tiff said...

Your legos are cranky sumbitches, weren't they?

I like how the sense of frustration eases up, then returns, then eases, etc, with the legos still getting the last word.

I'm pretty sure I wouldn't change a thing about this story. I t read well and definitely rang of childhood.

Also, thanks for updating. You've been missed.

Robyn said...

You have captured exactly my childhood experience with Legos. My husband is the Lego wizard, and I have tried to convey to him my frustration with building anything with them. I always ended up making a house! I never made anything else that looked like anything.

Shari said...

I couldn't even make a house.

PS - Thanks for cussing out my anonymous hate-commenter. You make me laugh with your profanity..

Anonymous said...

Wow. I'm at a loss for words. That was pure freakin' fun!

A most excellent piece, my friend... the essence of legomania couldn't have been better captured.

Anonymous said...

Well done! Great story, especially the sound effects and the wonderfully childish swear words. Poopy house, anyway.

Wotta cool idea, too.

Kingfisher said...

What is this? Adolescent goody two shoes clarityofnight.blogspot.com Oxygen Channel wussification? Puh-lease.

Something didn't work. What was it?

Fer crissakes. Quit blowing me and offer up some honest criticism. Or I give up on this whole exercise.

'struth.

Kingfisher said...

For instance, here's some I found:

"Snappety whomp." WTF does that mean? It doesn't fit the rest of the italics. "Whomp" is a destructive word, not a building one.

What's with the italics? Aren't you good enough to figure out a way not to use them?

"Rectangular base. Overlapping brick..." Is this a child's thoughts or a an engineering manual?

Who's talking? You didn't do a very good job of explaining.

"I want to stop playing, but I can’t." Ummmmm, why?

In 500 words, you used the word "make" 359 times. Fifteen yard penalty.

"...pieces being raked up." AWKWARD. Re-re-write.

This whole thing doesn't deserve a revision. Only good for the trash bin.

C'mon folks. There's some good wordies out there. Be real.

Shari said...

Hey don't yell at me!

I'm not even playing your silly game.

Geez.

Anonymous said...

cringes

Mmkay, Teach! Well, now that I know what this exercise is FOR, I'll take another stab at it. And, thanks for your feedback on my story and your own, I appreciate that (a) you gave it and (b) you specifically said what worked and what didn't.

Still an enjoyable story, and you can't make me not say that.

I don't have a problem with the description of a house and how you recognized it, because a child's thoughts are always perfectly clear and articulate to himself. At least you didn't say, "Hmm, running bond pattern, craftsman-style trim work..." At the same time, what other word for 'make' would a child have in his vocabulary? Create? Nah, too precious. Build? Ok, once or twice. I didn't notice it until you pointed it out.

The destructive words work fine for me as well, because angry creativity is something I'm very familiar with. Slamming around things I supposedly care about is sometimes the reality. Ever see a teen doing homework?

The part that bugged me is 'my mad makes me mad.' Clunky and unclear. And I'll agree on the question of why couldn't you stop playing, could have used a little insight into the rivalry between creator and created.

The sound of pieces being raked up is key to the experience, I like the phrase. Perhaps in the opening, setting the scene - then you could mention silence and it would make sense.

Kingfisher said...

Now THAT's what I'm talkin' about!

Thanks, Biff!

Sea Hag said...

My brother did the Lego thing for years so a lot of this rings true. You wouldn't think Legos would be such a noisy toy but they have a distinct clicky-snap sound when you're pawing through them.

I liked the fact that you put in the Lego sound effects, but I think they were overused to the point of being a cutesty gimmick at the end. Also the 'my mad makes me mad' thing was pretty confusing.

Overall, not a bad read.

By the way, I do realize that with my story I broke the 'rules' and for that you decided not to make any sort of constructive comment about it. That's your business, but I thought the name of the game was to improve our writing, not follow rules. Yes, it is a challenge to write with guidelines but if I can bend a rule or two and I get a better story out of it, that's what I'm going to do every time. So please, if you don't want to comment about anything I did, just abstain instead of leaving a snarky comment. I didn't appreciate that.

Kingfisher said...

Too fucking bad, Hag.

Wordsmiths is not your site.

Be free form on your own.

Look at the rules, you whiny little bitch. Then follow them, or don't participate.