Short Story in the Style of Hemmingway

Pep Ventura turned the steel cranks. Sweat poured down his face. It was a large hill, but he would conquer it. He would conquer it like he conquered everything. Through sheer will-power and force of will. The cranks of the Raleigh squealed under his will. The rubber handlebar grips felt firm and confident in his sweaty hands. He liked this feeling. It was the feeling of triumph. He stopped for a drink at the top of the hill. Cresting this hill was a triumph. He was triumphant and he drank. Then he remembered drinking during The Republic.

The café was called El Siete-Onze. He would often cycle there. He remembered the cafes before the revolution where he played much PacMan and Asteroids and drank much slushy. He remembered the way the slushy was cold and hard in his hand. The cold hard icy feeling felt good. He longed to feel this again. It was a hard feeling, and it felt good in his hand. Now, the filthy fascist revolving slushy machines dispensed insipid creamy mixtures of passion fruit and lime. The moveable feast was gone. He obscenitied on these fascist flavours and their creamy coldness.

But those were the days before the Revolution, when things were good, and there was Maria. Maria always encouraged him to climb hills and write, for she was a strong woman. She encouraged him to write and would sit him in front of his typewriter and bring him some absinthe and a pitcher of ice water. The ice was hard and clear and cold, and the pitcher had water in it. The water was clear and cold from the ice. She would pour iced water into the green absinthe, and say “Now write!” He would look at his typewriter. It was a Remington. It was his favorite Remington. It had hard, firm keys and it went tapity-tapity-tap when he pressed them. He liked this. Their firmness felt good under his hand. It was a triumph. He loaded some paper into the Remington. The paper was white and pure and not recycled. He looked out the window at the green hills of Africa. He knew what it was to have and to have not, and Maria was all that kept him from knowing what it was for men to be without women.

But now there was no paper. The fascists had seen to that. There was only the blinking of the curser, and the quiet insipid pushing of keys. He looked at his hands, and the rubber grips of the handlebars. The wind caught his hair and a gleam of sunshine punched through the grey clouds onto his face. The writing would wait today, for there were still many green hills to climb. He pushed off on the Raleigh, and continued turning the steel cranks. Another cyclist passed him on the left and rang his bell. He knew for whom the bell had tolled.





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