Posts Tagged ‘Midtown’

Uperman’s shipyard ran east along the nothern part of the Midtown coast that bordered the ocean. After a good stretch the coast and shipyard turn south for a bit more before rising into sheer rock cliff, too jagged and high for any ports. Old Midtown starts where the borders of the sandy coast meet the start of the rock cliffs. Most of the coast that was sandy beach in Metropolis sits dominated by the shadows of the ports that feed Uperman’s shipyard. Nobody went to the ocean’s edge to bathe or swim or anything else. Uperman’s ports never held any local fisherman, only sailors from the north or east in for the night on older ships, but that was rare. Most of the freight ships were completely automated and didn’t need any more than two or three to the crew. Most of the time the little crew would never leave the boat but instead stayed on board in their cabin. It didn’t make any difference to Stewart who never saw any of the ships or the sailors. Stewart worked in the yard in a little corragated aluminum metal shed of a portable. A long time ago the orignal Uperman had set up a system for the shipyard that divided the whole thing into sections. Each section of the shipyard had a little portable office with the assigned personel to run it. Stewart’s Section was called the East 101, which he never understood since his section was the furthest northwest in the yard, closest to Uperman’s Adminstrative office where Uperman himself sat everyday atop the fifth floor in an office that overlooked the yard.

Stewart walked at a quick pace, slanted against the wind that came down from the north east. A front had pushed in over night and left the morning sky with a short ceiling of dark clouds that kept the sunlight stone-grey. Every so often a drop or two of rain would land on Stewart but not so much as to be a bother on his walk to work. Not as much as the wind which came in waves thick and cold, and in gusts so strong he had to lean forward or else he’d fall over. Twice now he’d nearly lost his hat and he kept his left hand pressed hard against it lest a third time should take it away with an unexpected gust. In his right hand was a black briefcase which he held in front of his stomach trying to keep his dark brown coat from flying off. Every so often a low torrent of wind, creeping along the ground and throwing dirt in his shoes would hike up his brown slacks to show little brown socked ankles and the start of a pale leg. He hummed a tune despite the wind and was thinking of his work that day. His thoughts though, the ones he pictured this morning anyway, were only distraction away from his desire. He didn’t care to think of work either at or outside of it and was not the type to plan his day, as it hardly ever needed any planning by his hand, being mostly lined out for him already. Anytime he thought of work he was really thinking of Emily and hoping that the fax machine for Mr. Upermann’s office would break. But not blatantly, not to himself anyway. He’d never dare think of her directly but found ways instead to think of everything else at work. Today was no different and as he thought of all the insertion orders and invoice counts and receipt tickets he’d have to deal with he really thought of Emily, and he hummed.