Disappointing Future

My Sophie cajoled me into living a gypsy life. We have little. A wooden trunk holds velvet dresses covered with gold sequins and tiny brass bells, while a small, cedar-scented draw contains tattered pants and two neatly folded shirts. Nights I play guitar as Sophie, red hair glistening in the firelight, keeps rhythm with black castanets. Days Sophie tells fortunes in exchange for food. Eggs, a dozen carrots, deer liver, cow bones. She realizes good fortunes bring better food but never lies. Tonight our caravan burst into flames. Perhaps Andrzej was more upset with his future than we imagined.

Revenge Takes Time

This Saturday, Pegman took us to Great Yarmouth, UK. What a marvelous place. The more I write Pegman stories, the more I want to travel. Thanks to Karen Rawson and J. Hardy for being our writerly tour guides, and to Crispina for suggesting this area.

Millwrights demolished the old windmill, claimin the canvas sails too tattery to catch wind.
They built a new one that accommodates a fancy turbine pump and patent sails.

Lack of wind ain’t the reason they tore down the mill.
We all knows there’s wind a-plenty long the river.

Twas the ghost.

Laugh. I won’t blame you. Some say ghosts don’t exist.
For others, they’re as much a part of everyday life as eatin mutton or patchin a tear in your shift.

Differing reasons brings them people back. Too much love. Not enough. Unimaginable violence. Left-behind wives. Or husbands.
They all gots excuses.

There’s little comfort inside the new mill. The old one sounded with rhythm wrought by the wind.
But I’ll sit here, sewing the rips Patrick McCrory tore in my shift,
biding my time til Patrick’s great-grandson arrives to oil the turbine.

Then he’ll get his come-uppins for the sins of his ancestor.

Strange Doins

Pegman took us to New Orleans today. Oh! What could be better to write about near Halloween than an old graveyard? Thanks, Pegman!

Fabiola read them bones better en anybody. Yes, sirree, she surely did.
Chucked em in a rusted coffee tin, rattled em up, throwed em right on the ground.
Mind you, the ground had to be soft sand or ruffled-up garden dirt.
No concrete nor asphalt.

She told us them bones were from coyotes or pigs.
But soon we notices dat graves being tampered with.
Not zactly dug up. No.
But holes appeared, like somebody done been using a clam gun.
Or something like dat.

Den one-by-one peoples whose ancestors been dug up started gettin sick. Fluenza. Rat-bite fever.
Well, by rights, we mens needed to protect our families
so we took old Fabiola and throwed her in Bayou Teche.
Felt good about it, too.

Funny thing? Since Fabiola been gone, bones been appearing in trees long the trail to the Teche.
Thems that see um rot from the inside out.

 

Revenge

Susana stands stiffly, watching people run to the water’s edge, and return.
Each picks up a stone or bottle fragments polished by wave-driven sand.
Some discover Japanese glass floats in blue or green.
Others find pearls tucked inside broken half-shells. And squeal.
They have no idea they are stealing when they slip her treasures inside their backpacks.
Still, their ignorance makes her angry.
She conjures wind that whips sand, and rocks and driftwood into an angry funnel
that dances down the beach and swallows them whole.
Susana smiles in the silence and slowly bends to collect what is left behind.

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Nightshade Soup

Today Pegman took us to Gurara Waterfalls, Nigeria. Thanks k rawson for an inspiring place to write about!

Used to be we ladies came here to scrub de sweat out of de armpits of plaid shirts
and rinse mud off de cuffs of heavy jeans.
Those stains meant our men were working hard in the fields
to support us and our little babies.

Our skirts and blouses are held together with patches and buttons in odd places.
No one minds. Them ratty old clothes never kept us from laughin and kissin the little ones,
nor sharing stories over a communal fire while cookin a fine meal for our men.

But things changed after the oil company came
and our men got new jobs.
Now dey stay in town after dark,
drinking de beer and spending money on ladies dat ain’t us.
Now we don’t care if the clothes are clean.

Last week, we ladies had a meeting.
It was decided.
Tonight’s soup will taste slightly bitter.

149-words
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Fiolett’s Man

Today Pegman took us to Yellowstone. Besides Prismatic Pond, the mud pots were my favorite part of this national park, so I chose them for my story. Thanks for setting the stage, K. Rawson! (Translation of the names: Vulkan – Volcano, Fiolett – Violet, Jordskyelv – Earthquake.)

“Nei,” Vulkan forbade the use of even a cupful of clay from the mud pot at his feet.
“Please.” Fiolett knew if she had time, and now perhaps secrecy, she could create someone who would love her for all time.
“Nei,” Jordskyelv thundered, for he wanted her himself.

A month later, more than a cupful lay on Fiolett’s cabin floor.
The clay felt cool between her palms.
Days passed. Arms, gentle enough to cradle her appeared. Legs, sturdy and strong, soon lay beside them.
Shoulders, hips, a broad back, and finally, a head.
On this, Fiolett molded a face with features balanced between kindness and power.

She kissed her creation and slid him inside the kiln.
For ten interminable days, the fire burned.
On the eleventh, she opened the door.
Fire had done its work.
But so had Jordskyelv for the beautiful head of Fiolett’s man was completely broken and torn.

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Read the Table

I know ya’ll will think this real queer, but Netta jotted a note next to every wine stain on her tablecloth. Used a Sharpie; make it stick.

Weddin’ night 5/21/68
Mama passed 7/18/68
Baby stillborn 3/21/70
Bought me a rowboat. Waaaa-hoo!!! 8/20/70
For why did Hank shoot Boomer-the-Mutt? 6/1/71
Floozie in our house!!! 1/1/72
Hank done punched me!!! 3/12/73
Bought me a new fry pan, feelin’ better 3/15/73
Damn! Punched me again! 12/24/73
Walloped s.o.b. in the head Mary Merry Christmas.  12/25/73
s.o.b ain’t movin.’ 12/26/73
Real nice row in the swamp today 12/27/73

I’m tellin’ ya, read the table. Them dates is scattered, but the truth is in there. Guarantee.

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Inheritance

Since last week’s Pegman prompt was in a devastated part of West Virginia, our host decided we deserved a vacation on the lovely island of Mauritius. I looked at countrysides and ocean fronts and finally stumbled upon this drawing. When adding the picture to my post, I accidentally pasted it twice, side-by-side. The scene reminded me of an old stereoscope picture. So, I turned the offer of a fun light-hearted vacation into a bleak 150-word story. Sorry, Pegman.

 

Jacques-Henri peered through the stereoscope’s two prismatic lenses. After a long moment, the pictures morphed into a single, three-dimensional scene.
“You say this is Father’s land in Mauritius?”
“Indeed, sir. Acquired the property October 21st, 1810 along with the one-hundred-twenty slaves working the cane fields. Quite lucrative.”
“So all this is mine now, including the slaves?”
“Not exactly.”
“Not exactly?”
“You see, the slaves were freed in 1835. The freedmen and women remain on the land, but you don’t own them.”
Jacques-Henri peered closely at the figures on the road. “They still work the fields?”
“That’s what . . . ”
“Oh, get on with it, man! What are you trying to say?”
“They reside in the houses, till and harvest but . . . ”
“But?” Jacques-Henri roared.
“. . . keep the money from the cane sales for themselves.”
Jacques-Henri lowered the stereoscope. “Not any longer. Burn them out. Kill the men, sell the children. Bring the women to me.”

 

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Drawing the Line

 

I’s been workin’ in Massah’s garden over forty years. Planted beans, corn, rutabagas, watermelon.
Raised his childrens and his chickens. Only rung the necks of dem birds, though I wanted to kill dem boys most every day.
They was mean little ones and downright nasty as growed menfolk.
Killin all kinds of things cause they could.
I drew one big ol line when they shot my man; sold our baby girl.
Luckily no one ever checked the plantings. Deadly Night Shade grows over der in dat corner.
Now dem boys serve as fertilizer, though most peoples think dey be servin in the da war.

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Grandmother’s Advice

Thanks, Dale Rogerson, for these beautiful bouquets (haven’t I seen these beauties before?) And, thanks, Rochelle Wisoff-Fields, for posting them for the Friday Fictioneers.

Never sell yourself short, my beauty. Sometimes the world will require you to stay low as savanna grass; watching, waiting. Other times you must walk softly forward camouflaged as a delicate rose or an unremarkable daisy; collecting information, storing it in your heart. But a moment will come when you will be forced to take up the sword, shine like a bird of paradise in your glory and fight.
Machete resting against her fiery red dress, Rusayla strode across the sand. She had gathered and stored information about the men who stole her grandmother’s cattle. There would be no time to run.