The Great AMERICAN Novel

By Darian Lane

The action starts on the first page: Vincent Raswell, our protagonist, gives a brief account of his three friends, hyped-up and self-concerned fellows with who Vincent no longer feels compatible. So, he leaves them.

We jump into the car with a new Vincent, relieved of the burdens of fakery and meaninglessness. Raswell has taken to a wanderer's life; he's homeless, without a future, without a job; his only concern is a constant investigation into the truth around him.

Vincent probes into everyone's and anyone's life: a retail clerk, a pizza store patron, a homeless kid at a bus stop; all are studies for Vincent and his quest to grasp at deeper meanings.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Darian Lane
• Release date: May 16, 2022
• ISBN: 9798201537265

Darian Lane

Darian Lane was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and raised in Bethesda, Maryland. Graduated from Arizona State University and moved to Los Angeles to Produce and Assistant Direct Music Videos and Commercials. Best known for his work on over 350 Music Videos & Commercials—most notable for Muhammad Ali, Black-Eyed Peas, Chris Brown, Pharrell, Gwen Stefani, P!nk, Lexus Proactiv, VISA, Pepsi, American Express, and Beyoncé. Both of his parents are attorneys. Lane had ambitions of becoming a lawyer until he discovered writing. Many of his articles have appeared in The Los Angeles Times and EBONY. Darian Lane’s novels include: The Girlfriend Experience, Flashy Fiction (vol. 1 & 2), Hashtag, True Hollywood Stories, unabridged, GASLIGHT, The Great AMERICAN Novel, The Novel (a memoir) and The Sci-5 Fantasy. Available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kindle, Nook

Book preview

Introduction

My friends are cruel.

Anthony.

Yeah, I saw your girl last night.

Oh, I said, trying not to sound surprised.

Yeah, she’s a wild one—if you know what I mean.

I knew what he meant.

*****

Hollywood AKA Marco.

Half Black, half white, half Catholic, half Baptist, half in school, half out, half genuine, half opportunist. No one ever knew which half they were dealing with.

You know what your problem is, Vincent? The Opportunist. How do you expect to be a writer if you don’t listen? Great, just what I needed, another literary critic. He went on telling me, instructing me how to do my job; smiling, grinning, pissing me off. That smile! That Grin! When finished he sat back, stroking himself, nodding, thinking he accomplished something. Which he did.

I half listened.

*****

Look, these fries aren’t hot. This was Mike at his best.

Si, Si, dey hot, dey hot.

What I just say? Dey ain’t hot. Now take ‘em back! Vaminos! He shooed the McDonalds employee away.

She let out a heavy sigh, snatched the fries.

Hold up! Hold UP! Mike leaned in.

What? she stopped, resting her hand on her hip.

Where do you think you’re going?

Chore fries? She tossed the cold fries in the trash.

Don’t you snatch nothin’ from me! You hear me? Not as...

She turned, walking away, muttering something...something in Spanish.

Mike turned to me disbelieving. Vince, did you see that? Did you see that? Unable to fathom it himself. These people think they can treat Black folk any kind of way.

I shook my head, knowing full well he wasn’t through.

Actually, you know what? He had an epiphany. Where’s the manager? Get me the manager! Ima teach these Mexicans a lesson.

The Manager emerged—A Mexican. I walked out.

It was a year later and I had successfully disassociated myself from those leeches. They were still my friends, but we no longer kept in touch. I had quote-unquote changed. I took another look at the picture, the four of us—smiling; and ripped it to shreds, dropping the remains in the public garbage. Free at last! Free at last! Good God Almighty, I am Free at last!

One...

I walked down Main Street—again. Nighttime. Cars passed. Time passed. People passed. Not a single one stopped to ask for an autograph. How low can one get? And to top it off, I’m hungry. In my pocket? $1.87. Pocket change. Just enough for a slice. I looked up at the neon sign: One of the Greatest Pizzerias in Santa Monica, so say the LA Times. What did they know? In I went.

There she was. Eating by herself, reading. I loved her. That moment. That second. Love! What’s that you’re eating? I asked.

Garlic Cheese Bread, she replied; her voice clear, concise, to the point. I took out my pen and paper...

Hi! I just wanted to say HI to The Woman Eating The Garlic Cheese Bread. So I can say to myself, ‘I said HI to The Woman Eating The Garlic Cheese Bread.’ And I can go to bed content thinking, ‘I said HI to The Woman Eating The Garlic Cheese Bread. Vincent, you are a great man! You said HI to The Woman Eating The Garlic Cheese Bread.’  Maybe I would get a garlic cheese bread of my own, and we would eat garlic cheese bread together. Yes! We’d become garlic cheese bread eaters!

Go garlic cheese bread shopping, make garlic cheese bread lunches, garlic cheese bread dinners, even create the first garlic cheese bread....Yup, I can see it now. ‘Vincent Raswell, renowned writer, and the woman next to him eating the garlic cheese bread; they have made Guinness Ladies and Gentleman!’ We wouldn’t like the announcer, because his breath didn’t smell like ours.

I sat watching her eat that garlic cheese bread until it was gone, and she gone with it. Goodbye to The Woman Eating The Garlic Cheese Bread, I waved, but my hand didn’t move. Or maybe she didn’t see me. Yes, that’s it. Of course! She didn’t see me. I smiled and put pen back to paper.

The wind hit me crisp. Fog! I looked up at the neon sign, LA Times Greatest Pizzeria—Phooey! What lousy food!

It’s late, but not that late. Homelessness is half spent occupying your time. I had my Portable Nietzsche with me and had just begun reading the Third Part; the crucial part— the final chapter. I needed a light. Neon lights weren’t sufficient. They seem to cast glows, and fluorescents hurt my eyes.

I entered my favorite artsy coffee shop, on Main Street. I didn’t have any money, so I walked by the thin tattooed guy behind the counter. I’ll get a drink after I finish this chapter. I waved my Portable Nietzsche. He knew I was lying. I heard him with several other customers, Sorry, no discounts...I don’t care what movie you starred in...No Tabs!...Look, everybody has to pay taxes, including me. He heard it all.

There was someone in my seat. A girl! 25-30. She was reading. Her fingers covered the title.

So, whatchu reading? I sat adjacent.

The Hobbit. Tolkein. She responded, firm, not really wanting to engage.

Let me see. I took the book. A strong maneuver. She reeled back, her eyes wide. I read the first page. Carefully crafted manipulative garbage! I handed it back. So who’s your favorite author? I was eager now.

It took a while, but she came up with Steinbeck. I knew it!

Grapes of Wrath, I presumed.

Yes.

Why?

She deliberated, then, Because it’s so skillfully written. A well-told story. I appreciate well-told stories.

Nonsense! I was beside myself, The author knows where he’s going.

I like that.

You host the open mic here, don’t you?

Yes, she said, taken-a-back. She had no idea I knew this much.

What’s your name? she asked striving for leverage.

Does it matter?

She must have read my next line, You know my name. Almost child-like. A nice ploy, but I predicted it.

I looked at the movie poster hanging above, Brad. I replied, leaving out the Pitt.

Is that your real name?

Was she questioning The Great Vincent Raswell—Ultimate Writer? I thought of replying, It’s as real as any name, but to ward off a superfluous argument, Sure, I said, then blasted, I like emotion! All art is emotion. Painting. Writing. Acting. Singing. Emotion! The artist must have no idea where he is going.

If she were smart she would have countered, Whelp, I guess that’s where you and I differ. Matter of taste. And dismissed me with a sleight of hand. But, noooo, she went on a binge, talking about well-crafted intellectual novels, thus opening herself up to debate.

Don’t you get it? I shot. Everything meaningful in life is emotional. Think back. Everything memorable or even worth remembering in your life has been emotional. Am I right?

She sat back, contemplated, looked at the ceiling, the movie posters, and without agreeing, gave me a quote from Joyce.

What’s that? I yelled, drawing slight attention for the fella sitting perpendicular, Some philosophical reverie you wanted to interject at precisely the right moment? You’re not talking from the heart. That’s some cerebral bullshit I’m not interested in.

No! She got mad. You don’t know me! She was right. Yet surprisingly I knew enough. You are not going to get a rise out of me. I hope you know that. And I’m not talking to you anymore! She picked up Tolsin, Toppin, Token, and opened to the bookmark. But I could tell she couldn’t focus. The lines were just passing by, sentences no longer connected, words held no significance, connotation—she turned the page.

You’re feeling now, I smiled.

She got up and left.

Ahhhh...I eased into my seat. What a soft chair this was. Leather. Old leather. Soft leather. I sank in and opened my Portable Nietzsche. All of a sudden, he felt trivial, heady...his words weren’t grabbing me, stabbing me, piercing my soul, I put him down, and reveled in my latest accomplishment. Ah, yes, Genius! I decided to write it down. Word for word. Scribbling, scratching, adding, deleting, re-reading, I was done. I titled it Feather.

I was ready to go to bed. No, "bed" is not the proper word.

What a fine car I had. Black, 1995 Toyota Camry, two-door, tinted windows, V-6 gold symbol, sunroof cracked...I opened the door—funk poured out, smacking me up and down the street like a disloyal whore. Where was this stench stemming from? I bathed every day; no wet dreams, I made it a point not to eat in my house & home...I sniffed and sniffed—couldn’t figure it out. Must be the shoes (i.e. I never wore socks). I took them off, placing them in the trunk. Barefoot I stepped into my home, but not before brushing the loose gravel off my toes.

My routine...

Cracking the windows, sunroof;  I learned my lesson the first night when I woke up to everything dripping wet; pinning the sunscreen with visors; that morning sun is a killer, you’ll find yourself sweating at six in the morning.

In the backseat, at night, alone, with a down blanket, I wasn’t able to listen to music. I’d find myself wide-awake, singing-a-long. I turned to Family radio. The Christian broadcast station. It felt nice to be preached to. I wasn’t alone. Someone was there. Someone understood. Someone who cared. As soon as I felt myself drifting, I’d jackknife, turning off the ignition, falling back onto the propped pillows in automobile bliss...

Two...

Dear God,

Why did you have to wake up so early?

Un-signed.

I sat looking out the window, my eyes bloodshot. The morning dew, mothers with strollers, joggers, roller blades, idiots racing off to work, surfers, sunbathers, coffee shop patrons, everyone looked miserable. I checked my pager. 7:30am. Why couldn’t I sleep late like the rest of the happy world? No, I must wake up at the crack of dawn with nothing to do.

I checked the sign. No street cleaning today. I could go to the beach, lie out, read, relax. I stretched out my legs on the console—every part of my body ached. I looked at the floor. No Nietzsche today! Today I must finish Atlas Shrugged— at least before I die. I’d been reading this bible of a book for close to a year now. How can someone be 435 pages into a book and still not passed the halfway mark?

The beach is where I do my reading. There’s no sun. No humidity. Only fog! Santa Monica. I took my jacket. My leather jacket. Me, my leather jacket, my towel, my Adidas sweat pants, my wife beater, and my Atlas Shrugged.

I laid out spread eagle, on my stomach, Ayn Rand tucked neatly under my chin, ten pages in, I began to look around. Kids running full speed ahead, Kamikaze style—Bonsai into the waves. They were smacked flat on their butts. I laughed—a muffled laugh.

Mothers in one-pieces, sitting with just their legs exposed. They wore big hats, big sunglasses, big everything. Even their thighs were big. Yet they never glanced my direction, and I knew their every dimple. Those thighs! I was rapidly on my way to becoming a connoisseur of thigh. The woman sitting kitty corner was big, not in an overweight sense, but in a I eat a lot of cornbread kinda way. Somehow, I could see myself resting quite comfortably on That Thigh as she read Atlas to me in a whisper.

I dug my toes into the sand. Stop it Vincent! You’re fantasizing! Obsessing! Back to work. An artist must work, read, develop his mind. Back to work!

Twenty pages in; I slammed Ayn shut. Pointless! Why was she meandering like this? I know it’s all a set-up, but this is outrageous. "There are two sides to every issue: One side is right and the other is wrong, but the middle is always evil." I mean, she’s not wrong. But to be beating me over the head incessantly with these convictions—Ridiculous! She goes from melodramatic to didactic to...wow, look at that mother.

The way she sashays down the beach in her orange and blue sarong. Hips. The way they sway. No, she cannot be a mother. Too beautiful. And what legs! No, she must be the nanny. I wish I had a nanny, but with a nanny like that I might have never grown up. Where was my pager? 12:03 pm.

Time flies when you’re homeless. In a while, all the beautiful women would be coming out—two pieces, long hair, oils, tans...no Vincent, you must leave now, leave while there’s still time, still fog, go, pack up, head out! But...not before you take one last look at the nanny...ah, yes, the nanny.

I started the car, Janis roared to life. New battery, five-year guarantee. I sniffed my armpits –yikes. Good ole Janis. She was with me. Here, with the music. Us. Together. A duet. Singing...

Bally’s Total Fitness.

Total? They never had a total for anything. Ninety-eight easy installments. I watched every patron walk-in, get suckered...Listen sir, I dare you to try and find a deal like this anywhere else in the Greater Los Angeles area. Fifteen dollars a month! That’s our special. Today only. We have gyms all over. Across the nation! What if you want to cancel? What? Why would you want to do a thing like that? How could you even think such a thing? Fifteen dollars a month! Try and beat that. I heard it spieled so many times; I knew it by heart.

I rested my gym bag on the wet bench—a Polo Sport plastic gym bag; I got it special when I bought the cologne for Christmas. Now it was my lifeline. I waded through the empty lockers, opening and closing, some people still didn’t use locks, trusting people. When I found an empty, in my bag went. I took off every piece of clothing, and stood naked admiring myself. I wasn’t this carefree a month ago.

A month ago; I stood in my underwear staring into the mirror for close to twenty minutes. Until I got fed-up and said, Vincent, this is crazy, no one is going to stare at your dick. Off to the showers I went, naked—with a towel wrapped around my waist.

Today I didn’t need the towel, especially on that smelled like mildew. I shook off the loose sand and sniffed it again. Perhaps this was where the stench in the car was emanating from. It didn’t smell at the beach with the sea air, the birds, the thighs.

Once I dropped my towel in a shower puddle, and while I was blow drying it, a senile old man walked up, What are you doing?

His inquiry made me think I was going to have to engage in small talk, my secret repulsion. Old people love small talk. My towel is damp, I said, hastily through the blow dryer.

Why don’t you hang it in the sauna, it’ll be dry in ten minutes. He walked away.

Maybe this man wasn’t so senile after all. I hadn’t blow-dried since. Every morning I hung my towel in the sauna, my clothes in the steam room, and my body in the shower...

Their soap smelled like Palmolive. Dish soap! It was blue too. No wonder I stunk. To save on costs, I stopped using deodorant. A gay Mexican once told me he never used deodorant. I sniffed him, then pulled away.

How did you do it? I asked in shock, noticing for the first time our direct eye contact. I hated looking gay men in the eye. They could misconstrue a glance, yet he had my attention...

Your body creates its own deodorant. He grinned. You’ll have to sweat out the toxins from your system before you can go without. You may stink for a while, but in three to four months you’ll be smelling fresh and clean. Trust me.

Sweat it out, huh? I was sold.

In the showers another short Mexican was washing and re-washing his power tool. I looked down. He may have had an inch or two on me, but to be washing it that extensively—insane! He rinsed; lathered, caressed, rinsed, more soap, scrubbed, rinsed, more soap—it never ended. When he stepped out, he began polishing it with the towel, but by then, dish soap had turned into shampoo, and I lost him in the foam streaming down...

In the car I switched cd discs—Disc Two—To Love Somebody. Sing it Janis! Here’s a woman who knows pain. People driving by looked suspicious—we sang harder—when they heard our voices, the pain, they understood, on the 405, to Culver City, no traffic, the wind on my face, the sun on my neck, the music guiding me, I was weaving, singing, occasionally dancing, waving my arms, side to side, against the sky, God was smiling, waving back, the clouds were giggling, and I was singing!

I pulled into The University I Didn't Attend, and said Hello, Hi, to all the students, some I knew by name, some by face—shook hands with the faculty, patted the librarian on the back, listened to the Persians mispronounce my name—Wincent—nodded to the Black Security Officer, Don't take any wooden nickels, he'd say, I'd laugh—fake, then I'd take the elevator to the second floor, doors open, stroll down the hallway, stop, the bathroom, yes, I needed a quick check-up.

This city is trying to kill me, my brain said, as I stared into the mirror. I quickly ignored the warning and began patting and rearranging my half-dread, half-afro until I was able to say, Yep, I still look like a writer.  To the computer lab!

I had my love goddess in Chicago, Babydoll640—my country bumpkin in North Carolina, Kimsfadedheart—my California hippie chick, Veryhotlegs310—my artsy chic iNKspot212—my African queen — DChoney2D. What a writer I was...

Sweetheart, I typed. "I'm on the plane, sipping Dom, emailing you. When this God-forsaken plane lands, I'm going to rent a car. Either Avis or Budget—I hate Enterprise and their misquoting of prices. But today—money is no object. I'm going to rent us a sports car. A red sports car. Convertible! And before I get to your house, I'll swing by the flower shop, roses—white, perfect kind, color. Then I'll pull up to your house, home, trailer (just kidding), the convertible, me, the roses, and I'll honk. You wouldn't think me a gentleman because I didn't ring the bell; but then again there are still some things I can learn from a woman. You would open the door—a little pissed, but when you saw me, the car, the roses, all would be forgiven, and you'd yell something in the house that I wouldn't be able to make out, something like, 'See ya,' 'Lock up when I leave,' 'Make sure you clean up the bathroom,' I'd be pondering what you said as you leaped in the car, Dukes of Hazard style, then all those silly thoughts would vanish, and I would floor it. We'd be zipping down a

dirt road, like we were in a Chevy commercial, only it wouldn't be a Chevy, it's a Mustang, yes, that's right, a red convertible Mustang driving off into the sunset, only it's not sunset, it's noon, the day still ahead of us, and I'm driving, ninety miles an hour, the speed turns you on. Faster! We yell. You'd rest your tanned feet against the dash while I'd watch your flimsy skirt collapse between your thighs. You'd tilt your head back into the sun, your lips giving off a shimmering kiss without moving. I can't control myself. I rest my hand on your knee, it slips to your thigh, oh, and what a thigh, soft, yet hard, You’ve been working out, I'd say, you'd nod not wanting to ruin the aesthetics with words, I understand and keep quiet. I'm moving around in my seat, you don’t know why, you don't ask, you don't even look, then you feel my hand, it's sliding, slow, but steady, lower, lower, lower, until you back slap me on the chest with a grin on your face. I know this grin. I understand it.

And I shift my hand onto the steering wheel, wondering if I'd ever see that grin again. The wind would be blowing and I'd watch your top bounce, and bounce, you wouldn't be wearing a bra, a total freedom trip—every once in a while, I'd get a glimpse, and I'd be happy for the next three quarters of a mile. You could care less, as you shifted your seat into flat back position, your chin cocked, saluting the sun, your neck long, and untainted, your hair teasing the wind, I couldn't take it anymore. Guess I'd better stop there. Leave the rest to your imagination_"

No, no, no, They'd type, Keep going. Keep going. But by now I was bored, and the rest was tedious.

DChoney was the jealous type. Kimsfadedheart talked incessantly. With her online, I could entertain two or three at a time. Veryhotlegs was game for anything—California chick. But I spent most of my time hunting for Babydoll640. Oh, how I loved Babydoll640. She was the one. It was the way she wrote, described, the innocence, the raw sexual

power, the.... She did have a boyfriend, in Chicago, who didn't pay much attention to her, although he was able to find time to place her breasts on a scale — 4lbs 6oz.

One afternoon I convinced her to send me a picture. I gave her my email address, and within ten minutes—Voila!

Don't think I'm weird, she typed.

That seemed odd, I thought, very much unlike