The 505 - Norman Mailer

ENL 505 - Stylistics
Norman Mailer Assignment

It was just a college relationship in the big scheme of things. A million begin and end every day. But a big scheme of things needs details to matter at all.

Shannon was drunk again but Patty was just as drunk. Mitchell was the third wheel for a while but he loved to drink. Shannon and Patty rode their bicycle of booze all the way to the end of a night that involved stumbling, fighting with calls of “fucking whore” and “fucking asshole,” and the kind of gutless attempt at sex that can only be committed by people so desperate for some version of love or attention or mattering that they are willing to drunkenly fumble around till one pukes out a window and the other urinates the bed.

One time, Carrie, Patty’s roommate, flat out told Shannon that Patty was lying to him, that she’d been calling Josh all summer long and talking to him. Shannon had drank more than a few beers and so told Carrie that he was going to break up with Patty. He drove Carrie home and after he parked, they talked from the front seat of his car about Patty - the kind of person she was, and how it hurt them both. Carrie looked at Shannon and wanted to take a petty revenge on Patty by fucking Shannon, right there in the car if need be. Shannon let it go because he knew, just hours after saying he would break up with Patty, that he couldn’t do it. Even when Patty admitted talking to Josh, through his tears and the anguish in his heart, he couldn’t do it. Patty never even got mad at Carrie because she knew the relationship would never be in danger, Shannon being the way he is. Besides, Patty had to take friends any way she could get them, even backstabbing ones, on account of her fears.

Another time Patty slapped Shannon so hard on his face she left a purple-black bruise like a jellyfish covering his cheek. Patty had played high school softball and tried out for OU but said something about the coach playing favorites or being committed to the scholarships. She had a good arm, so it hurt. But there was nothing he would do, Shannon being the way he was, other than suffer it.

The heavy drinking and fights were almost nightly and the screaming bothered Patty’s roommates. One of the roommates, Rebecca, had been calling home, telling her father it was getting in the way of her doing her schoolwork. At one point, they were in couples therapy at the school’s counseling center. This was before the first break-up. Per the plan drawn up by the therapist, Patty agreed to limit the drinking on weekdays and they both agreed that before even going out to the bars, to come home after a pre-established number of beers. Shannon, excitedly and honestly, expected Patty to abide the plan they’d worked on with the therapist. Then one weeknight out, Patty starts flirting with a guy right in front of Shannon, smiling and bumping his hip as they all played pool. When Shannon said, “it’s time to go, you remember the agreement,” Patty just said, “I changed my mind,” as if she’d told a waiter she wanted the soup instead. Shannon couldn’t fathom what she’d done, what she’d said. Her roommates were there and saw it all go down. Before Shannon left alone in shame, for some reason he felt the need to tell them “I’m not a bad guy.”
            In one sense, it was the beginning of the end, but in the big scheme of things, there never was a beginning to have an end.

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Word Count: 618

Write: For this assignment, take a brief piece (500-750) you have written and revise/ write in the style of the featured author. In other words, revise so as to mimic the style

of the featured author. You can, as well, compose a brand new piece in this style.

Style: Norman Mailer (specifically, The Executioner’s Song)