Martin put the off-white china mug to his thin lips and took a long drink of his rapidly cooling coffee. His eyes scanned over the classified ads for the hundredth time but, once again, there was nothing. Nothing in his field, nothing in his area, nothing, nothing, nothing. The pen poised in his right hand tapped against the page angerly and he took another mouthful, swishing the lukewarm liquid between his cheeks.
"Good morning, pumpkin." Candice's bare feet padded along the bare hardwood behind him, and Martin soon found his girlfriend's arms wrapped tightly around his chest, her face buried...
Gradually.
That was the secret, wasn't it? Build up their trust or indifference, either one would do, like in that fable about the mouse and the lion. First it was hello over the mail as they each made their way back to their separate apartments, next? Why, after months of chit chat, it was coffee shared in the buildings laundrymat. More chance meetings, more talk about incidentals, info on her fake bio. There was no need for him to learn of her unpleasant past. He would only get the wrong idea.
It wasn't really lying, not when she was honest...
Potatoes.
The bane of my son's existence.
I set the plate down in front of him with a futile hopefulness that today might be the day that he wouldn't wrinkle his nose and recoil as if it were something deeply offensive. But it wasn't. And he did.
"I don't LIKE potatoes," he growled, glowering up at me.
His father frowned and made to reprimand his son's insolence, but I held up a hand to silence him.
"These aren't just any potatoes," I declared with authority, "These potatoes are grown by superheroes."
My four year old looked skeptical, but as he...
Idyllic farmhouse? Well, appearances can be deceiving, I suppose. If the For Sale sign in front had said, "Abandon all hope, ye who enter here," we might have been more wary. As things stood,, when we signed on the dotted line we had no idea what we were really buying into... or signing away. The funny thing about souls, you don't really notice them until they're gone.
"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...
Thou wanted to enjoy his iced latte
Thou wanted to bring the mood down in this joint
Thou wanted these tourists to be gone
Be gone tourists!
Thou forsakes thee!
Tourists
Poseurs
Wanna bees
Beardos
Thou is the grumbly heart of your demise
Thou is real
Really real
So frightening
So fucking real
Thou is not on tourist maps
Pamphlets
Brochures
Thou will burn away all this fake tourist bullshit
Thou will bring the mood down
in
this
joint
Ceci n'est pas un garçon.
A dry, sandy summer like this one. I had met him just a mile down, by the Shell gas station, his cowboy boots kicking up a torrid storm as he leaned against an electric pole and kicked a Pepsi can out of his way -- it rolled like a tumbling weed before coming to a halt at my sandal-wrapped toes.
I picked it up, sand and dust whirling around me, forcing themselves into the slits of my eyes. "Hey cowboy."
He looked at me and said nothing. He lured me in with absolutely nothing but an intense blue stare as...
Fish meant for market was found dumped in a bin outside the school. The mother believed the rotting smell would disguise her hidden bundle beneath. Her post-birth addled brain forgetting only papers were supposed to be in that container and what she tried to dispose would be eventually found.
Margarita wasn't a bad person. She did what she thought best at the time. Took her baby to the church and left her on the steps timing so the priest would find it. The bloody towels, rags, her own clothing stuffed below the fish. She kept the umbilical cord and placenta....
The voyage was all fun and games until the iceberg came.
Nobody had invited the iceberg, and it seemed to show up out of nowhere. One moment, Rockwell was painting the dog on the banister, the next, the iceberg was full frame in the painting, like someone who hasn't noticed that you're taking a group photo and decides to walk right in front of the camera.
There was no use reasoning with it. It was obstinate, unmoving, rather dull to boot. At dinner that night, the usual good cheer in the ballroom had evaporated. Everyone was silent. The old colonel...