Romance is Dead

The following are carefully selected excerpts from my latest entry into the teen romance genre, Romance is Dead, to be found at the discount bin or garage sale nearest you.

With a foreword by Stephanie Meyer's cease and desist letter.

From Chapter One: A Rose is Still a Rose Unless It's Dead

Jane sat in her desk in third period English, but couldn't concentrate on the teacher going on and on about Romeo and Juliet. All her attention, every ounce of focus her ADD-riddled mind could muster, was channeled onto the boy sitting next to her. His scraggly hair; his soft, dark skin; his piercing eyes that stared with an intensity Jane had never seen before. They never dared to blink. Never dared to waste a fraction of a second not taking in the world around him. “There's something different about him,” Jane thought. “Something my need for affection and juvenile, misguided love can't quite put a finger on.”

“Clearly, he is a zombie,” Mr. Teach said. “The 'something different' is that he has been dead for months and is rotting. You should probably stay away from him.”

Jane broke her longing gaze and looked up at her teacher. “You...you can read my thoughts!?”

“No,” Mr. Teach replied. “You've been talking out loud for the past minute. And, frankly, I don't see how you haven't noticed that he is a zombie. Just look at him!”

Jane returned her gaze to the boy sitting next to her. It all made sense. She could see now that his scraggly hair was because most of his scalp was missing. His soft, dark skin actually looked like it was composed of month-old bananas, and his intense eyes were just the product of having no eyelids. Also, it explained why he had been drooling and making rude gurgling noises.

“What do you know!?” Jane burst. “You just don't understand him like I do! So, what if he is a zombie?” She lowered her voice and squinted her eyes for effect. “Why don't you just go on teaching about Romeo and Juliet, or whatever, and stay out of my personal life!”

“Perhaps that is a good idea,” Mr. Teach sighed. “Maybe you could learn something from this cautionary tale.”

“What could I possibly have to learn from some stupid Shakespeare story?” Jane questioned.

Mr. Teach looked perplexed. “You mean you don't see the parallels here? Dramatic and ridiculous young girl. Forbidden love. Ends in death....” He trailed off as he saw Jane was too busy doodling hearts with “Jane + Zombie 4 Eva” written inside to pay attention.

“Well,” Mr. Teach said as he walked to the chalkboard. “Now we are going to study foreshadowing. Say it with me, class. Foooreshaaadooowing.”

From Chapter Three: Denial

“Eeew, gross. If it isn't Zombie and his stupid girlfriend, Jane.” Sherry, the snarky head cheerleader, leaned against Jane's locker. “Don't you know that the only reason Zombie is dating you is because he wants to eat you?” Jane grabbed Zombie's hand tighter and spoke up.

“That's not true, Sherry! Zombie loves me for me. Honey, tell Sherry why you love me.” Jane turned her doe eyes at her love. His jaw was mostly detached, and his lips had eroded, but he tried to gargle a response. “Come on, spit it out, Baby,” Jane encouraged as she dusted off a couple of maggots from his shoulder.

“B..bb...brains.” He spoke quietly, but the stench of his breath was like a barrel of dead skunks.

“See!” Jane exclaimed. “He loves me for my intellect. Zombie doesn't care if I'm the head cheerleader or not. He wants a woman who can have a deep conversation.”

Sherry twirled her hair through her fingers and smacked her gum loudly. “No, you idiot. He wants to eat your brains. He wants to crack your head open with a spoon and gobble it like bread pudding.”

Jane was noticeably shaken. “Tell me it's not true, Baby!”

Zombie replied with the only word he knew. “BRRRRAAAAAIIINSSSS!!!!!”

From Chapter Nineteen: Acceptance (Kind of)

“I see things clearly now, Zombie.” Jane was running her hands through Zombie's remaining hair as he jerked and chomped at her fingers. “Haha, stop playing, Silly! Your love for me is only rivaled by your insatiable desire to eat my flesh. But that's what makes our love so intense! Every time you don't bash my head on a rock and slurp up my brains like soup, I know that's your way of expressing your love for me.”

Zombie looked at her with his cold, dead eyes and stretched his arms straight out from his body. He moaned and sputtered as he wrapped his putrid hands around her throat.

“Oh, Zombie,” Jane cooed as she playfully slapped his hands away. “You don't have to measure me for a necklace. All I want is you. Let's go spend time alone deep in the woods.”

From Chapter Twenty-Seven: Not in Kansas Anymore

“Welcome back from Christmas break, class,” Mr. Teach said cheerfully. “This semester we are going to study convenient endings in literature, but first, a pop quiz on your vacation reading assignment. In The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, what is the Scarecrow missing?”

The class was silent. Students looked at each other and shrugged their shoulders.

“No one?” Mr. Teach paced the floor as he spoke. “No one knows what the Scarecrow was traveling to the Wizard to receive?”

Then, from somewhere in the back row, a familiar, raspy voice echoed through the class room. “BRRRAAAAIIINSSSS!!!!”

Mr. Teach was amazed. “Yes, Zombie, you finally got one right!”

“But Mr. Teach!” Sherry interrupted. “That wasn't Zombie!” She pointed to the girl sitting next to Zombie in the back row.

Every student in the class turned around and stared in horror at Jane, her skin now a dark, sickly green and her eyes lifeless and unflinching. She gurgled something unintelligible as she reached across the aisle and grabbed Zombie's hand. They were two star-crossed lovers who defied the odds...and the grave.

THE END

From the back cover

“I haven't read something so riveting since the back of my Froot Loops box this morning at breakfast.” Amy Harper, The New York Times

“This is the worst zombie book I've ever read. It is also the worst romance book I've ever read. However, it is only the second worst pop-up book I've ever read.” Jonathan Gillman, Newsweek

“I've scheduled an operation to graft several hands onto my body, so that when the film version comes out I can officially give it nine thumbs down.” -Roger Ebert

Don't miss the next volume – Romance is Dead: 2 Deaths Don't Make a Life

Dear Taylor, Nothing Gold Can Stay

Dear Taylor,

I am writing you this open letter, posted on my blog, to discuss something that will be difficult for you to digest. I didn’t want to make this a public matter, but according to the legally binding directives issued on your behalf from a federal court, I am not allowed to contact you through “phone calls, text messages, the U.S. Postal Service, the Canadian Postal Service, email, smoke signals, standing under your window with Peter Gabriel playing out of a boombox, American Sign Language, Canadian Sign Language, relaying messages through your hair stylist’s roommate’s cousin, arranging your AlphaBits cereal, or shaving love notes into the side of your dog.”

A dog this size takes lots of tranquilizers.

You see, Taylor, you have left me with no choice but to tack these hurtful words onto the internet and hope you somehow see it. You might want to take a seat, preferably in a sturdy, comfortable chair with hand rests in case you slump over from the shock. No, not that one. Sturdier…ok, now we’re ready.

Taylor, I am leaving you.

Now, I know you must be inconsolable at this point, so I hope you have a guitar nearby to absorb your tears. I never understood why you didn’t simply wipe your face with tissue like everyone else, but we all have our little quirks, and that is not why I’m leaving.

And it’s not because you’re more famous than I am, you being an international music sensation that has sold 20 million albums worldwide and me being best known for my gripping portrayal of Johnnycakes in Emma Sansom High School’s production of The Outsiders. Because I know that if smartphones and YouTube had existed in 2004 that I would have been the first actor to ever win an Oscar for an internet video, and that I would now be starring in highly acclaimed blockbusters with Hugh Jackman, instead of what I’m currently doing in my free time, which is starring in an off-Broadway Pig Latin musical called “Les Iserablesmay”.

And it’s not because of the disparity in our income. Sure, you made $30 million dollars last year, which, if you include assets from birthday and Christmas gifts, is $29,998,273 more than me. But, I quite enjoyed basking in the riches of your chateau before you kept changing the security code and forgetting to tell me, or before your security guards grabbed the butter knife out of my hand and yelled at me for being an “obsessed lunatic” and told me to “get out of here before we call the police.” They must have been new, and did not recognize me from the macaroni art I made of myself and hung above your fireplace. I was just in the kitchen making you a sandwich, Taylor. Because that’s what kind of guy I am. (This may not be the right time, but as a side note, you are all out of peanut butter.)

Seriously, how did they not recognize me?

  

Heck, it’s not even because your hair shines more majestically than mine or that you are a foot taller than me when you wear heels. No, none of these things mattered, and, in fact, I found them endearing, at least when they weren’t igniting crippling waves of jealousy.

What it all boils down to is that, well…you’ve changed. And I’m not saying it’s for the worse, although if it were for the better one would have to assume I wouldn’t be leaving. It’s just that in the beginning you were so full of real-worldedness and down-to-earthitude. We used to stay up all night talking about Romeo and Juliet and how hard it was being fifteen years old. I mean, they might not have been actual conversations so much as they were me falling asleep by myself while hugging my iPod, but I know those songs were meant for me. But now…now our conversations have grown tiresome, and I feel our connection waning. It’s just hard to relate to you now. Crashing Kennedy family yacht parties? Hanging out with One Direction? Forgiving Kanye West!? I’m just a simple marketing professional with a revolving grasp on reality, Taylor. And I’m afraid that the simple Tennessee girl whose heart I was guaranteed from a surprisingly expensive back alley voodoo priest is gone forever – lost to the glitz and glam of Hollywood. Well today I am deeding you back your heart, Taylor, and you can give it to the Justin Bieber of your choosing.

I would like to arrange a meeting with you to exchange our belongings. I’ll take back the aforementioned macaroni portrait of myself, along with the scarf I gave you last Valentine’s that I knitted out of my beard trimmings. And you can have the collection of your used q-tips that you probably didn’t know I had and the book of letters you wrote me titled “Taylor’s Diary: Do Not Read!”.

I am sorry things didn’t work out, but I should really not be surprised. Innocence and optimism are often qualities of youth, and age tends to kill those charms. And although our lives have taken us in different directions, it doesn’t mean that our paths won’t converge again. I’ll think of you every time I turn on the radio, if you promise to think of me every time you hear bushes rustling outside of your window.

To paraphrase myself quoting Johnnycakes referencing Robert Frost – “Stay Gold, Taylor”.

Sincerely,

Nathan