Disaster Productions

By Brian Bakos

Matt’s struggle to win media fame by his 14th birthday leads to escalating disasters. Add some romantic complications and things become really disastrous.Young Adult humor.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Brian Bakos
• Release date: Jun 21, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301201679

Brian Bakos

I like to write and travel. I'm from the Detroit area originally and try to see other places as often as possible. My most recent travels have been to China, Ecuador, and Belize. Am thinking of my next destination. It's wonderful how travel inspires the writing process. Attended Michigan State University and Alma College.Not much more than that. Anything else I have to say comes out in my books. If you really want to know more, please contact me through my website, https://www.theb2.net/. May life bring you many blessings!

Book preview

One: Thrust for Fame

1. Director of the World

I’m surrounded by high school kids.

Hey, move it, dude! a guy shouts. You’re in the way.

I roll astride my bike, running my feet along the concrete in the middle of the crowd, trying to keep up with the flow. Somebody gives my rear tire a push.

Giddy-up, cowboy!

People laugh. I want to jump off and start swinging, but what chance would I have against so many? Besides, I don’t know who the comedian is among the blur of faces.

I can’t escape the press of bodies on the sidewalk and along the grass. High school kids walking, running, yelling, shoving. A claustrophobic panic reaches for me, as it does in jammed elevators. I force myself to remain calm.

There are boys ranging from jocks in varsity shirts to regular types like me, dressed every which way. Girls, too, all of them incredibly grown up. They walk together or with boyfriends, while other guys trail behind admiring them.

Everyone is so big!

Nobody pays me the slightest attention now that I’m not blocking the sidewalk. I feel about as important as that used paper cup tumbling along the pavement. Somebody steps on it and mashes it flat.

We had a half day at South Middle School to give us extra study time for finals. I’d assumed the high school would be dismissed early, too, so I came to check things out undisturbed. I was sitting on my bike trying to peer through the green-tinted windows of the media center when classes let out, sending this wave of students rushing over me.

Guess I should have gone home and studied.

The crowd halts by the traffic light. A glowing orange hand holds us back while kids drive out of the parking lot calling to their friends or yelling insults at other kids they don’t like much. I’m finally able to detach myself from the mob and roll across the street.

Look out, dipstick! someone shouts from the window of a turning car.

Pedestrian traffic on the other side is much lighter, and my claustrophobia fades. I stop on the grassy median in front of a house and take in the entire high school. It’s long, enormous – even if you don’t include the attached Center for the Arts. You can submerge into nothingness inside that place and never be missed.

I’ll be going there in a few months when the twin rivers of freshmen flow in from South and North middle schools.

That is way too soon! My friends are all fourteen already, some well past. My 14th birthday isn’t until October. If it was only three days later, I’d still be going to middle school in the fall.

Then I’d be a whole year smarter, bigger, and stronger when I got to this gigantic place. As it is, all the best girls will think I’m a twerp. I’ll be the last one to drive, the last one at everything. I’ll be Mr. Nobody. There has to be a way to keep myself from getting swallowed up.

My imagination does a huge shift. I seem to be looking at everything from an elevated distance, like a movie director sitting on top a camera crane. That mass of people moving along the sidewalk is an army of extras in my production. I’m ‘Matt the Man’ in a world where I don’t have to care about being ignored or rejected – a place where people seek my approval.

I’m Director of the World . . .

Get off the grass! a man yells from the house.

He doesn’t seem very friendly. Too bad he doesn’t recognize who I am; he could have had bragging rights in his social circle.

I saw Matt Alpin back when he was still a nobody, he could have said.

But he missed his opportunity.

2. Retreat to the Empire

I must be wearing my dark and thoughtful expression when I get home because Mom doesn’t try to start a conversation.

I retreat to my ‘basement empire’ with its ancient TV and little refrigerator filled with soft drinks and beer. On a day like this, bright and sunny early June, my upstairs bedroom is too exposed to the world’s uncertainties. I need a quiet, dim place to sprawl out and ponder my future. The beer is off limits, of course, and Dad keeps an accurate bottle count.

The big One Four birthday is coming this autumn, and I’m not famous yet. I’m nowhere near becoming ‘Matt the Man.’

Soon I’ll be another faceless high school kid shuffling in the crowd, looking at the girls who don’t even know I exist. It won’t be long before I rush through the teen years, get married somehow, and have kids of my own.

At my funeral, my kids will say, Yeah, Dad was all right, but he never amounted to much.

Okay, I know this is a morbid way to think, but the idea of being a terminal nobody is driving me nuts.

* * *

I’m into my second Bomb Cola when I hear Mom open the side door.

Matt’s downstairs, she says. See if you can get him out, will you, Stephan?

I sure will.

Stephan Chrono, better known as Duals, clatters down the stairs on the great mission to cheer me up. He looks his usual self – thoughtful and easy-going at the same time, like he’s one step ahead of things. Maybe a bit shifty, the type of guy who can out maneuver people.

Duals picks up on my mood the instant he sees me. You look depressed. Did your dream girl shoot you down?

I’m trying to think up a Big Idea, I say. Something that will get me a lot of attention in the world.

Hmm, Duals strokes his chin. Sorry, I can’t help you there.

How about a Bomb Cola?

No thanks, never touch the stuff.

Duals is not a Big Idea guy. He’s what you’d call a left brainer—smart, well-organized, good at details. I’m more of a right brain type—creative, always dreaming up stuff I haven’t a clue how to make real. The ‘Director of the World’ scenario, for instance.

When I get to feeling invalidated and pushed to the sidelines, I often escape into this imaginary place where it’s me calling the shots.

Right.

It’s not that I look weird or anything. I’ve even been referred to as ‘good looking.’ I just feel weird sometimes, like this isn’t really my world.

Maybe Duals and me working together could be a whole brain. We’ve done it before. Back in sixth grade, we built a volcano science fair project that vomited realistic lava, all hot and smoky. It drove people out of the gym and set off the fire alarm. We’d have won first prize if everyone hadn’t been so ticked at us.

Maybe my dreams can come true. If I get the right partner, come up with the right Big Idea…

Duals waves a hand in front of my face. Earth calling Matt.

I drop back to the basement reality. Pull up a chair.

Sure, thanks. Duals selects a fold-up from the corner batch. Did you spend your afternoon pounding the books?

No. I stopped by the high school. Thought I’d scope it out.

How’d that go?

Oh, man, we’re gonna get swallowed up in that place.

Duals unfolds the lawn chair and sits next to me. Not necessarily. It’s a question of finding your niche.

Niche? You mean like those little compartments in mausoleums where they put cremation urns?

You’re in a grim mood today, Matt.

I’ve been down here an hour trying to sort things out and getting nowhere. The feeling of power I experienced while imagining myself as a movie director still haunts me. It seems to be the key I’m looking for, but how does it work?

And what could I record with a camera, anyway – kids walking along the sidewalk, people standing in line for soft-serve? Maybe I could film the guys unloading the produce truck at the grocery store.

Duals waves his hand in front of my face again. I get the jump on him.

"What have you been up to?" I say.

I went to the mall with Dylan. Big mistake!

What happened this time?

We met some interesting girls, and things seemed to be going well. Then Dylan starts with his show-off talk, trying to be cool. You know how he is.

Yeah.

Next thing you know, he trips on the steps by the fountain and lands flat on his face.

I practically choke on my drink. A squirt of gagged-up cola burns my nose. The girls must have been impressed.

"They didn’t stick around long enough to tell us. That guy is a total disaster."

Then I have it.

Oh, man! I jerk back in my chair and smack my forehead.

Go easy with the Bomb Cola. You can’t handle the caffeine-sugar hit.

No, it’s not that.

I hurry to the wash tub and toss in my unfinished can. It fizzes and hisses like a rattle snake. I’ve finally got the Big Idea.

That’s nice… what is it?

I raise my hands dramatically, spelling out my future in bright lights. The Disaster Dylan Show!

Duals looks confounded. Huh?

Look, we all know Dylan is a screw-up. Bad things happen around him. He’s jinxed.

What’s your point?

The point is, people will love that stuff.

They’ll love Dylan?

If we package him right, I say. It’s a matter of following him and recording his various disasters. We post the video online, it goes viral, people demand more. Next thing you know we’ve got a reality TV show.

Duals has this astonished look on his face, like he’s just seen the tooth fairy come fluttering out of the floor drain. That’s quite an idea. You think it’ll fly?

Why not?

My hopes are soaring, the world is falling into place. Energy surges through me, and it isn’t just the cola.

Think of all the reality shows. I’m talking fast, almost stumbling over the words. None of those people would have accomplished anything if somebody with a Big Idea hadn’t shoved them out there.

That’s true. Those shows give a push to all kinds of losers.

I slam a fist into my palm. Man, if we’d just caught him wiping out on the stairs!

Now you tell me. I could have used my cell phone.

We’ll need a more high-end type camera. My Director of the World personality is kicking in, big time. Something that’ll give professional results. Make our product stand out.

Duals is on his feet, stroking his chin in that deep concentration way of his. There’s only one problem. Where do we get this ‘high-end camera?’

My high-flying balloon loses some gas. Oh, yeah…

Then I have another inspiration.

I’ll ask my Grandpa. I’m supposed to visit him Saturday. He’s leaving on one of his trips soon.

You think he’ll go for it?

I don’t see why not. I’m way beyond recognizing obstacles.

Saturday, huh? Duals says. That’ll give me a few days to research cameras and stuff.

You’re in?

Duals smacks me a high five. In.

Great! Meet me here Saturday morning, 10:30.

Okay. Duals moves toward the stairs. Guess I’ll be taking off now.

See you Saturday.

Duals pauses. He must be recalling Mom’s request. Want to go outdoors a while? Take a bike ride, maybe?

Can’t. I have to stay here and keep thinking.

Got it.

Duals goes up the stairs and out the