Suicide Club

Six lucite Ghost chairs lived around the table, their clear frames a counterpoint to the true star of the room — a large oak beam originating from Henry VIII’s fleet. The Mary Rose only came to surface in the early eighties. A handsome sum must have been paid to the intrepid curio dealers who smuggled this plank to our Mr. Hobbs. At each chair lay two crisp sheets of ecru writing paper embossed with an interlocked “S” and “C” arranged amid lilies and, of course, a Blackwing pencil trained into a long point.

“No pressure.”

Blank stare.

“It’s half the press.”

“Oh, I understood, it was merely in poor taste.”

“Humor not a strong suit in these kinds of places?”

“Let me hang your coat. The others should arrive soon, and then we can begin.”

“Hang.”

“If this continues, we may have to ask you to depart early. I beg you to endeavor towards maturity.”

Suppressing the D rounding on her tongue, “Your show, boss.”

Roxy sat in a middle seat figuring the head should be preserved for someone more important than her charity acceptance into the workshop. This was rumored to be an exclusive club of esoteric writers, technocrats, thinkers, tastemakers, and those whose work was fundamentally shaping the mores of…