Outside Looking In

Sophia stands knee-deep in snow
clad in a once-elegant
now raggedy, red-velvet cape

she has occupied that table
no, no, not the corner table
that one is saved for people in love
the other table
the one set for four

when she and Thomas were together
there were never four
just him
just her

him bringing blue sapphire rings
capes of velvet
her carrying hopes, dreams
and laughter

champagne flavored kisses
nights of love so strong it made her hurt
inside and out

but now, tonight
he’s laughing with his wife
and two children
creating a balanced table of four

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.

One Too Many Arguments

Today Pegman took us to Cape Town, South Africa. While scrolling through the sites I found this lovely sculpture on the lawn – somewhere.

“Damn it, June! You’ve hidden my eyeglasses again.”
You can’t keep track of your own nose, old man. “I think you left them on the lawn, next to the lounge chair, Samuel.” June tosses a sweater in the laundry bag.
“Why on God’s green earth would I do that?”
Why indeed. “You read out there last evening.” Five pairs of underpants and a bra go on top.
“That has nothin’ to do with nothin’. Where’d you put ’em?”
If I had a penny for every time you asked that I’d be rich. Two shirts and three pairs of slacks fill the bag. June tugs it closed before lacing up her favorite tennies and slinging the bag across her shoulders. “I’ll go check.”
” ‘Bout time you did something worth doin’.”
Junes steps on Samuel’s glasses on her way to the car, ticket to France bunched in her fist. It sure is.

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Timothy’s Savior

Well, isn’t this desk a fine mess? It almost makes me feel like cleaning mine – almost. Instead, I wrote this 100-word story about it. Thanks, Rochelle, for posting yet another picture to make the Friday Fictioneer clan put fingertips to keyboards.

Tick-tock, tick-tock.
Timothy ripped the clock from the wall, pulled the plug on the refrigerator, threw his computer out the window just to quiet its hum. No sound should remind him of his old life. Still, his heart pounded so violently, blood rushed in his ears – like the echo of ocean waves caught inside a nautilus shell. That’s what Angie would have said. But Angie, his heart of hearts was gone. Absolutely nothing mattered.
“Daddy?”
Timothy turned from the window. And there, standing with her stuffed penguin clutched in one hand was little Beatrice. He knelt and opened his arms.

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