"What's the worst thing you ever done in a Church, Sunshine?"

I looked at Beloved, I shrugged, although goosepimples and ice water prickled my body. "I killed a pigeon once."

"What?" Beloved laughed, his mouth pulled, his cheeks puffed and he pinched one lens of his glasses, pulling them up his face. "You're kidding."

"Nope," I said and I walked away from him, my arms clasped behind my back and I looked back and forth, up and down, and touched the smooth paint of the white-washed pews. "I killed it dead."

"WHY?" Beloved was still smiling, I did not have...

Her cheeks were as pink as her dress, blotched with red that matched the little bows that tightly held her blonde hair up in two ridiculous pony-tails that resembled palm trees. Her mother did the dog's hair like that as well. Jonathan always wondered how someone could want a second Maltese instead of a daughter.

Was he being unfair? Probably. It was something he slung at Marie as their last fight as a married couple wound down. That fight he'd carried on with such spirit convinced there would be break-up hate sex, but that shot at her parenting skills effectively...

I am the apple of her eye.

All of them in fact.

I have five aunts, and a mother.

Mom calls me the Little King, her little Emperor, the man of the house. Where is my father? I don't know or care.

My aunts have always been there. Mom defied everyone when she got pregnant, as far as I know my aunts have never been courted.

They are my court. They laugh at my jokes, they bring me snacks, they make me cocoa, they run my baths. When I write stories they print them and paste them in a book,...

I'm lost.

The corn fields turned into and endless turning of green upon green, and I couldn't run because the leaves had become blades.

I've stopped walking. I've stopped screaming. Screaming only made me thirsty, and I even tried tearing a corn leaf to pieces to suck on something, anything. I tried to pull an ear and when I pulled the leaves back, a handful of black ear wigs fell onto my lap, pincher butts spread wide. I wiped them off and ran.

Something cut my upper arm.

I lay now, staring at the sky, it's gone from gray to...

Loved him for an evening.

Sienna had a way of loving them that way. In one evening her compassion for the man at her side transcended adoration.

The men usually left quickly, a blur of parties, cigarettes and alcohol. She was happy enough that way, and of course so were they.

The man in the red hoodie was a bit different. About ten years younger than her if she cared to admit it. As slim as her, with large, dark, cow eyes. Sweet as pudding and she let him linger a week.

Apparently had found religion recently, tried bringing her...

"Do you like the cats, young one?"

Lilibit pressed her white, lacey gloved hand over her throat, "Yes, my Lord," she breathed. "I've always wanted to see them, since my childhood!"

Sajin laughed, the bells at the bottom of his robes jingled, "You are a child yet, Little One."

Lilibit scowled, "I am a young woman. At the very least. I am not a child."

"Do you feel such?" Sajin asked, squinting, his dark skin shining from cheek to forehead in the way everyone did in this humid, emerald land. Lilibit for her part, felt sweat from head to toe...

I love you.

The last thing he told her before taking a drink from his soda, setting it down, taking a deep breath and then wandering straight into the traffic that killed him. Family legend says that he'd lost a lot at the tracks that afternoon and then on the final race, he'd won the mother load.

Happiness like that for a compulsive gambler can be too much. The take was huge but the win was too much and he went out on the highest of notes. Plastered to the front of a dump truck.
The newspaper clipping has it...

Marie loved apples.

That would make her smile.

It was bad enough that Eric had messed up her homework, it was supposed to be a joke, who knew the dog would actually eat it. Puppies do that. She'd kind of laughed it off. She'd taken the shredded remnants of it to school, she'd come back, shadows under her eyes and Eric, waiting on her porch asked if she was in big trouble.

"Nah," she replied, "They laughed. I'm forgiven this time, and so are you."

Big hug.

And she munched a Pink Lady apple, a double celebration. She had one...

Leonard stumbled back. He almost fell. His heart raced and sweat stuck his shirt to his belly and back and armpits. He'd had patients worse off than Bea, patients with bloody ends, with pointless existances, tortured creatures that lived and died hooked to electricity and strapped to beds. None with the relative safety and comforts that he'd been treating Bea in, the comfort of home.

This was a scheduled meeting in the garden, she'd come from the trees, barefoot, bare arms, makeup garishly applied and with the gauzy veil over her face. His boy would laugh, he imagined, would point...

Sadie didn't believe Mother when she told her it would be a greater adventure than the ones she entertained in the garden. Mother squeezed her, kissed her cheek, and they all laughed once upon the summit. The air was so cold and dry it cracked the skin of her cheeks and it chapped her lips, yet it felt thin and clean, like the waters from the stream.

The ladies breathed heavily, hands on their lower backs, stays pinching them into a dazed sort of happiness. The men gallantly offered arms for them to lean on.

They lingered a bit longer...