Writer's Block

Writer’s Block

He sits in front of the screen, staring. Just staring. A look on his face indicates puzzlement and his lips begin to move, though without sound. He stares ahead of him and finds his voice.

‘I know him. I know that man. I’m sure it’s him – his glasses seem heavier. Thicker lenses? It’s the glasses I remember. You look old with those glasses.’

He looks away, down at the table, sees the keyboard. He looks closely: Q W E R T Y U I O P … Yes, he knows this. He looks up at the screen, at the man in the screen.

‘You’re a writer, aren’t you? You make books. I’ve read your books. A writer.’

He frowns and looks down at the keyboard again. His left hand moves tentatively and he presses his thumb against the space bar. Again he presses the space bar and lifts his right hand to press on enter. His hands go back to his lap.

‘So you just press these buttons? You just spell out your stories letter by letter, word at a time.’ He giggles for no apparent reason and says ‘Sentenced to death!’

A sudden look of fear transforms his features. He lifts his hands to shield himself from the man on the screen whose own lips are moving, quivering.

‘What did you do that for?’ He asks. ‘Why did you say that? It’s not the end yet – I’ve not started the story yet. I’ve not started the story!’

He’s shouting now, angry with the man on the screen.

‘You always make me stop too soon when I’ve not finished!’

His hands are resting on the keyboard as he accuses the bespectacled man in front of him. He types – ‘Once upon a time’, and giggles.

‘No, that won’t do.’

He smiles and the man on the screen smiles back. He looks at the keyboard and begins to type out words at speed. Occasionally he looks up and the man on the screen returns his smile.

After some fifteen or twenty minutes his pace slows. A thousand or so words typed, and his fingers come to rest. He leans forward over the keyboard and scowls. The scowl changes to a look of despair and grief.

‘It’s gone.’ He slowly looks up and talks to the man on the screen. ‘It’s not there. It’s supposed to be there. Can you remember what it was? What did I write?’

His left hand moves to the space bar and he presses it but it’s an action he’s not conscious of. He stares at the man again.
‘Aren’t you a writer? I know you – I’ve seen you. You’re a writer.’ A gentle smile of recognition and then he says, ‘Tell me what you’ve written.’

His fingers tap at the keys, a subconscious action as he quizzes the writer, a reflex action from somewhere in his past. One hundred words a minute as he taught himself all those years ago. He laughs aloud; his laugh is hard edged and will not stop.

‘What’s the matter, Alan?’ The nurse walks into his room briskly. ‘Do you want me to turn your computer on? Are you going to write us a story?’