Death Tells a Story

I’m so grateful to Rochelle for posting the Friday Fictioneers prompt a day early! I’ve missed being here and her wee error was perfectly timed. She truly is a wonderful Fairy Blog Mother!

Most have forgotten. Shame on them.
Some say it never happened. They are wrong.
I was there, picking up the pieces.

Before it began I collected grandmothers exhausted by a good life,
babies that died too soon, worn-out fathers.
A simple cycle. Life. Death. Life.

After? Oh, after, I lifted souls from broken bodies on battlefields,
from children in the rubble of bombed-out houses,
from Jews, homosexuals, the crippled and mentally insane
left in makeshift graves dug in forest mud.

Please believe me. I do have a heart.
And you, mankind, broke it every day for six interminable years.

Choices

No need to tell me your sad story. I know how your world worked with Angela. Upside down. Crisscross. Days and memories folding over one another until you couldn’t tell up from down.
Sometimes she was the woman you couldn’t wait to see, other times, angry times, you ran from her, faster than the wind. Even after your children disappeared you found reasons to stay.

No crying on my knee. No bunching my skirts and wailing about Angela locked behind bars. She made her choices, you made yours.

At one time my choice was you.

Lake Whatcom Divorce

when we met
you said you would do
anything to get money
in order to take care of me.
you bought me furs, diamonds,
two, no three, trips to paris.

i never asked how you paid.
why would i?
why should i?
i was hopelessly
ecstatically in love.

marriage was never mentioned.
i didn’t reveal
boring, unimpressive tom.
avoided asking if you had a wife
or children.

today, flying high over the lake
you, at last, reveal your secret.

tom, you say, is tired of me.
has paid for everything.
you inform me
the final payment arrived today
then shove me out the door.

 

Lake Whatcom is about a half-mile from my house.

https://www.tripadvisor.com/Attraction_Review-g58350-d2527907-Reviews-Lake_Whatcom-Bellingham_Washington.html

But We Did See

Well, this is certainly an interesting picture. Thanks to Rochelle Wisoff-Fields who chose the photo and to Roger Bultot for submitting it to our Fairy Blog Mother.

We called you Big Stan the Pretzel Man. Not kindly. You didn’t seem to mind. You gifted us salted pretzels slathered with spicy yellow mustard and told stories about your grandma, cotton plantations, the hard times and the easier ones. We kids sat, picking scabs on our knees, gobbling pretzels, wanting to get away while our mother’s voices repeating, “Be polite to Stan” rattled around in our heads.

The day they found you beaten, your cart burned to a pile of twisted metal and exploded glass, we pretended we hadn’t seen anything and slowly drifted away.

Taking Advantage

It’s Wednesday/Friday and Rochelle Wisoff-Fields has posted a thought-provoking photo taken by J Hardy Carroll to prompt our Friday Fictioneers gang to write a 100-word story.

My Aisha is talented, she shorely is. The first time that child picked up a crayon I knowed she was something special. Didn’t stay inside the lines, drew purplish cows and green moons.

On tuther hand, her brothers were all dumb as posts. No pappa should say that bout his own children but it’s God’s truth.
They proved it too. They’s all dead now. Drugs. Guns. Vehicular accidents.

But Aisha, she be sellin her paintings for five-hundred dollars a pop.

What? Hell no. I don’t let her keep that money. I’m the clever one in this family.

 

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The Hermit

Today is Wednesday/Friday and Rochelle Wisoff-Fields has provided the Friday Fictioneer’s gang with a picture taken by Jean L. Hays. I’ve always loved the prairie and tried to prove it with my 100-word story. Sorry, my muse went on the dark side.

The spicey smell of sagebrush, prairie grass warmed by the sun, and the scent of earth soaking up rain never grow old.
Howling wolves and yip-yipping coyotes don’t bother me one stitch. Shows things are still alive out on the plains.

My music? Prairie dog barks, the thrum of sage-grouse, and the flute-like whistle of meadowlarks. Don’t even mind the skritch of mice pilfering breadcrumbs.

It’s people I can’t abide. Asking fool questions when they knock on the door.

That’s why I built me a bunker. Sometimes it’s over-crowded but then one dies and the others can spread out a bit.

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The Land of Cobblestones

I must admit I’m addicted to Friday Fictioneers, so today I put aside an hour of editing my manuscript to add a story to this mix of wonderful flash fiction writers. Thanks to one and all who find time to read my story.

Siegert pulls the picture from his pocket.
He knows exactly how many cobbles create the path
from his old room to the gardens,
the rectory
to, well, anywhere on the grounds.
He’s counted each with his feet.

Excitement welled when Siegert heard adopted.
But soon he hears,
“The boy’s quite stupid. Rarely talks.”
Silence is golden, they told me so
“He stumbles.”
I cannot see out of my left eye
“No one actually likes him.”
Please, all I want is love

The train whistle blows.
Siegert knows it’s but a ten-hour trip back
to the land of cobblestones and priests.

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