The Fifteen Minute Novel is a novel written fifteen minutes at a time with each week day’s section starting with the sentence from the previous day. At least it is attempting to be a novel. For now I am just aiming at one continuous story, worked on for fifteen minutes each day. Started Friday January 1st, 2021 (in case you want to search for the beginning. I can’t wait to see where it ends up. It could be good, or it could be a mess. We’ll have to see. For now, here is today’s fifteen minutes.
Day 155: He knew she had emotions, but even in his head he couldn’t picture her actually showing them.
He knew she had emotions, but even in his head he couldn’t picture her actually showing them. Emotions were viewed as a weakness. James shook his head. He couldn’t even begin to imagine any reaction other than a blandly polite acknowledgement. It was simply beyond the scope of his experience.
James let the thoughts go, finding them somewhat uncomfortable. He cleaned up from his sandwich and tried to decide if there was anything else he needed to do before work started Monday. He remembered his work clothes were still in the dryer. Jams rinsed any jelly residue off of his hands, realized he hadn’t found any kitchen towels yet and dried his hands in his jeans before picking up his laptop and the bag holding it’s associated cords.
He took his gear up to the bedroom, deposited it on the bed and went to the dryer. All in all he was rather pleased someone thought to put the washer and dryer closet on the upstairs floor. It was placed between his bedroom and the stairs leading down to the main floor. Having it there meant laundry wouldn’t need to be hauled up and down but could just be dumped into the machine in passing.
Because his clothes sat in the dryer for a while, James turned the dryer back on to let it run for a few minutes, hoping the extra swirl of heat would eliminate any wrinkles that might have accumulated from their time waiting. As they spun around, James returned to the bedroom and shifted items around. He needed to be able to see his alarm clock, so he cleared the night stand.
“I don’t want to trip in the middle of the night if I have to get up, or first thing in the morning, either,” James reminded himself. He made certain the path between the bed and the bathroom was clear. It wasn’t the neatest thing in the world, but he thought he’d be able to keep himself from causing himself damage.
He also decided the clothes ran for long enough to eliminate any temporary wrinkles. James returned to the dryer, took out his clothes and hauled them back to the bedroom. When his work clothes for the week were hung in the front of the closet within easy access, James declared himself settled enough for the moment and sat down on the bed. He booted up his laptop and pulled up a browser. Several things immediately came to mind to search, most in relation to his old company.
James remembered he was allowed no contact and instead pulled up his new neighborhood. He poked around finding out that it was in a good school district. There was no home owners association but there was a neighborhood bulletin page. It had information about the community pool and other local events. It seemed like the kind of thing he would have enjoyed if he had kids. The events listed seemed to lean in the direction of young families rather than single homeowners.
James poked around on city sites again looking for information on cars or classes. He found several classes for knitters and a couple for beginning bee keepers. Neither sets of classes looked like something for him. James thought about widening his search and instead found himself typing in the name of the family company.
“Searching is not contact,” James told himself.
Ten til Midnight 