My mother toils under the assumption that she is beautifully imperfect but the world should be perfect. She reacts to news like a small child. Living in the moment with the belief that what is going on now will be what goes on forever. I am her child and I am the same.
We slump together from depression to remission, my mother and I. We stay on the couch for days at a time drinking wine, eating Oreos, and watching reality television. Then Mom gets an alimony check or I finally land a job interview and the fever breaks. We...
Becky hoped Tom saw what she had written before her teacher did.
Mr. Smith was notoriously tidy about the things in his classroom. Desks were wiped down once a day, not by the school janitorial staff but by him personally. In other classes she knew friends who would write on the desks, leaving messages for the students who sat there after them - a sort of school texting service between students without cell phones, but Tom took only this one class after her. Would he see her message? She could pass it off as a doodle and if he said...
'Vanquished. V-A-N-Q-U-I-S-H-E-D. Vanquished." Poppy smiled, proudly, scanning the audience for her parents. There was her mother, beaming at her. Camera in hand, ready to capture every last moment of the Spelling Bee. Her mother was so embarassing, thought Poppy, but at least she cared. Her eyes flickered across the room, until they settled on her father. As usual, he was standing at the back, his eyes glued ot his Blackberry. Typical. at least he was here, usually he missed every dance competition, every spelling Bee, every sports day. He wasn;t really there, though. His body might be standing there, but...
He heaved a sigh as he walked down the hallway. The revolver hung heavy in his hand. He had no idea what model or brand or whatever the gun was supposed to be. He'd gotten it at a pawn shop for $15, along with a little blue soldier toy for a mere 50 cents. It was cheap. The paint on the toy was chipped, but its expression of determination haunted him.
He was exhausted. He was done. He couldn't take this any longer.
"Hey, kiddo..." He called. He'd reached his son's room. This was probably the first time they'd talked...
“Pob lwc.” the elder of Saint Joseph’s had wished me, after his strange warning. I presumed he meant for my first Mass to be held, as traditional, at Midnight on Christmas Eve. It went well, the service, with a fuller than expected attendance, to see the ‘new man’, I presumed.
Later, sat still in just the candle light, I sighed, thinking I’d found a final home. It was then that the Bwgan Fawr sighed too. A man of middling years, he seemed, from one of the middling centuries, but as translucent as chip paper fat.
He pointed at the great...
"I hope we never grow up," Kate said.
"We will," answered Petra, "But we don't need to grow old."
The memories of that day forty years ago raged like a swollen river in Kate's mind. They had been 10 years old, dressed up in her mother's too large dresses, jackets and hats. They had a tea party and Mr. Bear was making some very funny jokes. Dolly was being quiet and nibbling at her cookies. But Petra was singing and dancing.
"I'll marry a handsome man who will take me to dances in castles," she had said.
A tear pooled...
I was all wrong. This wasn't the spot I thought we buried her. Jason was in front of me pointing left, and the sky was darkening. My mind was all over the fucking place. He's pointing left, when I swear we buried her right by this patch of weird leaves that looked like lettuce. Still, Jason swore that we needed to head left more. Really, when you commit such a crime, and forget where you buried the body, needing to go back to get it because you "accidentally" left the weapon right by the body, possibly with your prints... going...
The wind blew across the plains, picking up clods of dirt as it ran past, and I gripped my son's shoulder, as if by some instinct. Soon the dust would blow through the cracks in our log cabin, and the kitchen -- the tiny corner we called the kitchen -- would soon fill with what looked for all the world like soot. That we could take. The ground and the wind had been trying to kill us for years. We were used to it. But lately we'd had to contend with spiders. Tarantulas. Tough sons of bitches that put their...
I couldn't sleep with her next to me. i was half scared that she would just disapear, it had been so long since we had been here like this and I could hardly beleive it was real. I just wanted to watch her, soak in every last detail of this moment I knew couldn't last.
I wanted to remember how her hair fanned on the pillow. Some might liken it to a halo, but to me it seemed more like a lion's mane. I wanted to remember how she smelt, how her chest gently rose and fall as she slept,...
My feet ached, but it was well worth it. I mean, how many times in your life do you have the opportunity to attend a championship? Sure, I had to park about three miles from the stadium. Sure, I somehow missed that city bus that was barreling directly toward me until it was too late. Sure, once the bus rolled over my feet, I experienced agony beyond anything I could have ever comprehended to that point. But we're talking CHAMPIONSHIP, man!
I had to drag myself the remaining half of a mile, crawl to the turnstile, beg to be admitted...