There may not be a Santa Claus, dear Virginia, but the good news is he was never going to put good dialogue skills in your stocking anyway. So who needs him?

A few posts back, I talked about the importance of quality dialogue in our writing. I mentioned a dialogue-only short story I wrote on assignment a few years back. I dug it up to send to a friend and writer peer–figured I would post it here as an example of how much dialogue can accomplish all by its lonesome. Not saying this is great writing, but do think it exemplifies the weight our dialogue can throw around in our stories.

I am encouraging you writers out there to try this assignment for yourself. Post the examples here in the comments if you like, or blog your stories and link them here…my original story assignment had a higher word-count requirement, but write only the amount you need (which should always be the rule anyway—remember Thomas Jefferson and his cry for less unnecessary wordiness)!

The only non-dialogue caveat for this assignment is that the writer may begin with a few sentences to set up the scene. The rest must be dialogue only—not even “he said, she said”. Have fun, learn something, and “Ho, ho, ho…Happy Holidays!”
 
 

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CALL ME SPARKY

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[From the handwritten transcription of an illegal recording perpetrated against Jack Leon “Sparky” Ruby (a.k.a. Jacob Rubenstein) by then Dallas Chief of Police Jesse Curry (tape not recovered; margin notes indicated source). Pages discovered by Curry family members retrieving belongings after the decorated officer’s death, the pages hidden beneath several miscellaneous documents and numerous pictures of Curry’s deceased dog, Sheba, now believed to be the same animal rescued from Ruby’s parked automobile several days after the murder of Lee Harvey Oswald.]

 

“It’s a goddamned conspiracy, that’s what this is.”

“Come on, Jack. Let’s get on with it.”

“Look, I’ve told you a hundred times. Call me Sparky. All the fellas do.”

“As I said, Jack, I’m keeping this on the up-and-up. Professional like.”

“Yeah, yeah, I appreciate. But you gotta promise me you’re going to believe me about this conspiracy thing.”

“The coffee conspiracy?”

“They’ve poisoned me!”

“Bad coffee. Right. I’ll see what I can do.”

“You’re top dog in this little town. I’d hoped for better.”

“Dallas is not so small anymore.”

“Just got pretty small for me, Jess.”

“Chief.”

“Huh?”

“Just got pretty small for me, Chief.”

“Keeping this professional like.”

“Please.”

“It’s your tribe, Chief.”

“Fine, Jack, so let’s say we move off the coffee thing for a while? We don’t have a lot of time.”

“Time’s relative.”

“You wanted to talk. It won’t be long, Jack, and you’re going to be so far into the system you’re going to need a surgeon to cut you back out.”

“We don’t have a lot of time, is what you’re saying.”

“Jesus, Jack.”

“We’ve been friends, right Jess?”

“Professional, Jack. We’ve been professional.”

“You got a funny way of looking at professional.”

“I may be the chief, Jack, but that won’t stop me comin’ in there and puttin’ the boots to you. Nice and proper like.”

“Wouldn’t look good at the press conference, though. You’d agree.”

“Say what you need to, or we’re done. The world’s gone to pieces outside. The President’s dead. And you inserted yourself right in the fucking middle of it. I can’t keep the storm from you now.”

“All I’m doing is agreeing with you, Jess. There’s professional and then there’s professional.”

“What are you looking for up there, Jack?”

“Joints like this got cameras in places even guys like me wouldn’t think about cameras.”

“Cameras.”

“Microphones, too. Little ones. Like could fit under, say, a police chief’s fancy suit.”

“Microphones.”

“All I’m saying is, a man’s got to be suspicious. And the coffee around this town could kill a guy.”

“A coffee conspiracy.”

“Just like that, Jess. Just like a fucking coffee conspiracy.”

“Fine, Jack, it’s your funeral.”

“Probably so. But not so soon as you’d think.”

“Because of you, no one’s ever going to know, Jack. God help me, what the hell were you thinking?”

“Bet they serve some god-awful coffee in this place.”

“You’ve gone and done it. Brought the whole world down on you.”

“Never trust a guy doesn’t drink coffee is what I usually say. I happen to know you don’t drink the stuff, so an exception in your case, Jess.”

“Lord almighty, Jack.”

“I can trust you? I mean really trust you, Jess?”

“Yes.”

“Because we’re professionals and all.”

“I’ve covered for you a lot of times, Jack. You, the clubs. All of it. A hell of a lot of times.”

“Professionally speaking.”

“You’re one to be fucking around with this thing.”

“There’s no appreciable coffee production in Cuba, Jess, did you know that?”

“What the hell are you talking about now?”

“No, seriously. And you should be writing this down.”

“Writing it down.”

“To think about later.”

“I don’t know why I thought I should help you, Jack.”

“Everyone knows how much I’ve been to Cuba. It’s no secret. So I know about the coffee in Cuba, or lack thereof, is kind of the point I’m tryin’ to get to here.”

“If you’re going for the insanity defense, I won’t help you with that.”

“Ain’t going for any chicken-shit insanity thing. I’ll be going down for this one. I know what I am talking about, though, you better damn well believe it. I think I’m the only one that knows the damn truth, Jess. Lee Harvey sure as hell don’t know it anymore.”

“Not since about one o’clock he sure as hell doesn’t.”

“You ever met Evie, Jess?”

“Evie?”

“My sister, Eve.”

“No, Jack, I don’t think so.”

“She’s a sweet girl, Jess. Just so damned innocent and all. Not all full of it like me. Not a big, immovable ape like me and my kind. Just a sweet soul. What would I do, I let something terrible happen to her? Wouldn’t ever be able to live with myself.”

“Sure.”

“It ain’t fair even to imagine that kind of thing. She just got out of the hospital. She’s okay now, but things happen to people. God-awful, even inhuman things sometimes. Can’t let that happen.”

“I know how it is with family, Jack.”

“This is more than about family. This is about taking one for the team.”

“What team?”

“I gotta be sure I can trust you, Jess.”

“There isn’t much time left.”

“Then here’s a little something extra for you, though you should skip the pencil and paper on this one. Commit to memory is what I am saying.”

“Roger.”

“Don’t fuck around with me. Not you. I fucking hated the Army. Everyone knows that.”

“I thought you did well there. You always said you did good.”

“Hated it.”

“Okay.”

“Here’s the point I been tryin’ to get to. Some of the best damn French coffee in the world comes from Vietnam. Bet you didn’t know that, did you?”

“Vietnam.”

“War stopped it, though. And began a hell of a lot of other things, of course.”

“Jack, I couldn’t care less what kind of coffee comes out of Vietnam.”

“Or other things.”

“The Feds will be here any minute, Jack. Stop talking in riddles.”

“Just think, for example, of all the coffee-producing countries that are getting themselves an extra piece of the pie as long as that fucking war keeps warring itself.”

“Jack.”

“War isn’t always a bad thing, not if your coffee sales are on the rise.”

“Right.”

“Or other things.”

“We’re done. Believe it or not, I feel sorry for you, Jack. He was your President too.”

“Goddamn right he was. And I am sick inside. He didn’t want any more of that war, though, did he? Think for a minute, man. Those coffee-drinking bastards decided to stack the deck. You just have to ask yourself, Jess. Who are the real beneficiaries? Who are the goddamned coffee drinkers?”

“Take care of yourself, Jack.”

“You want to know the real reason all the fellas call me Sparky?”

“You got one hell of a temper. Seen it first-hand.”

“Not claiming I don’t, but that ain’t really why people took to calling me Sparky.”

“Any minute, Jack. Any minute they will come down here and take you away.”

“Beans, then.”

“Beans?”

“Technically, it’s the beans. Coffee is 99% water—so you’d want to think that the water has the most to do with it. Most obvious choice, I’m saying. Quality of the water can influence, sure, I’ll give you that. But mostly it’s the beans.”

“Right.”

“And remember: it’s also where they come from. Focusing on the beans and not so much the water is what I am trying to get through that thick cop skull a yours. You been riding the desk too long.

“Whatever you say, Jack.”

“It’s kinda the opposite of leaving the peas and carrots and concentrating on the steak. Real soon the peas and carrots and coffee beans are going to get scarce. Buried, even.”

“Look, I came down to maybe get you to come clean, give yourself a fighting chance—and yes, it’s because we’ve been friends. I even like you, Jack, which is more than I can say about a lot of my friends. But you committed murder. In cold blood. In my police station. God help me, Jack, you did it on national television. So it’s going to get worse. A kind of worse I am not sure you are up to.”

“You know what cancer feels like, Jess?”

“What?”

“I mean, you ever had cancer?”

“No.”

“Thing is, you don’t so much feel it as know it. Like when you were a kid. When you just knew the boogeyman was down in the cellar, underneath the stairs. He didn’t say anything, and he never quite got his paws around your little ankles as you ran those stairs two at a time. But you knew he was there just the same.”

“You saying you got cancer, Jack?”

“I’m saying I got all different kinds of cancers, Jess. And I’m also saying the boogeyman is for real, just like you thought when you was a kid. But here’s the rub: the boogeyman, he coulda had you any time he pleased, but he never wanted you from under the stairs. He wants you where he’s got you right now.”

“Who’s the boogeyman, Jack?”

“Figure of speech.”

“If there’s more to this, now’s the time to say so, because you are about to go for the ride of your life. And I think we both know where the train ends up.”

“You may be chief, but even you don’t want to know who they are.”

“Who is it, Jack?”

“You know, I thought maybe I’d get it just like Lee Harvey. ‘Course, not gut shot. Quicker for me. Couple in the back of the brain. Should’ve known with those bastards, though, when they took to handling their own mess, it would be more contemplative. More devious. Way they operate, is all I’m saying. Poison can give you all kind of cancers. No matter. I poisoned my own goddamned soul a long time ago.”

“Who did the contemplating, Jack?”

“Do you think it’s noble, to do something terrible to save someone innocent?”

“I don’t know.”

“Or would you just call it selfish?”

“Jack. I have to let them talk to you now.”

“The Federales.”

“It’s not personal anymore, Jack. I’m sorry.”

“Electrocution.”

“What’s that?”

“I said ‘electrocution’.”

“Maybe, Jack.”

“No, I mean, when I was little. Kids dared me to stick a piece of metal from my father’s garage in an outlet. I wasn’t ever street smart, probably why I never got past the nightclub business. So I took the dare.”

“The Feds are coming.”

“It was kinda dark. They all laughed their asses off, said they could actually see a spark jump off the top of my little head. Swear to god. Hurt like hellfire. The name just stuck.”

“They’re here.”

“Coffee-drinking, goddamned boogeymen, Chief Curry.”

“Time’s up.”

“Never going to say. Never.”

“Good luck to you, Mr. Ruby.”

“Chief?”

“Yes, Mr. Ruby?”

“How many people you know would leave their best dog in a car to die alone?”
 
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The blank page is dead…long live the blank page.
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