TMGriff, well written, I enjoyed reading it
I find reading too many words on the computer screen is hard on the eyes, so sometimes I print it out...because, it's so much easier to read on paper.
Thinking story writing, in memory of Cavfancier:
The TownHouse
Two gals lived in nifty digs on two levels. But this swank townhome had a drawback that Chelsea was always trying to 'fix' and of which Celia was afrighted. The understair closet had a crack that actually went through to 'real dirt ground'.
The anxiety began from a yard raking Celia did in the spring, and raked a little 6 inch snake, big as a fishing worm- from under the house edge smothered in leaves- screamed and yelled, "WE'VE GOT SNAKES!"
The following incident, Celia again- removing a box of articles from the understair closet and beholding a large spider sidling from the underground crack. OH, UUUgggghhhh! Out came the spray, (the starch, the hairspray, finally the disinfectant).
First next time to the market, Chelsea bought bug spray, treated the area, and tacked a bit of carpet over it as best she could. Celia examined the patch, grumbling with pessimistic snorts as she ran a comb under the crack. "It is still not REALLY covered", she moaned.
But cool time has a way of burying old urgencies. Summer came and they had a blast at the pool and jogging after work. There were parties, movies, great days in the sun- and fun evenings in the air conditioning watching tv.
Cleaning days did come too.
Celia was dusting the bookcase in the Living Room when... as she tumbled a few books out, she saw the dark spiral curled in the back of the bookcase. "AARRRRGGGHHHHHHHH- SNAKE, snake, snake"....she almost fainted. Chelsea ran swiftly and grabbed a book and pinned it to the back wall hard, with the stiff spine . "Quick" she puffed, "I need a knife... go into the kitchen and get me a knife or something... oh, and bring a light- the flashlight, there on the counter"
Celia stood trembling.... "Oh, I just knew it, I told you, I told you..."
"Will you get me the knife before the damn thing gets away here, I am in a bind!" She stood bent over to the shelf, with one foot forward, the other bracing from way back and her arm almost twisted.
Celia ran back with a kitchen knife, and while putting it into Chelsea's free hand, she gingerly turned the flashlight onto the shelf.
Chelsea released her grip on the book, and it fell flat allowing the shriveled purple balloon to relax.
Two pairs of eyes stared at each other, as panic gave way to manic-
They convulsed in the floor with laughter.
Thanks ed-
It's a true story, just the names have been changed to protect the foolish-
Good morning colorbook,
Thank you, I appreciate your comment.
I would really like to read some more stories from A2k writers. They are always good.
This was one of Cav's favorite threads...he too, wanted more stories from a2k writers
I definitely am not a serious writer, but, I do enjoy reading short stories from others
and that reminds me, I've been meaning to ask Edgar when his book "Ebenezer's Ghost" will be published.
Ebenezer will be out in about three months, but don't hold me to that.
Wow!!! You are all wonderful writers.
Edgar, I was pleasantly surprised with your writing. Your very good! Glad I found this thread.
Gus, just love your writing.
Thank you very much. A2K has some good people writing poems and stories. If I were the management, I would compile a book of some of the best and publish on LULU, print on demand publishing house.
Thats a great idea edgar. Some poetry chat rooms on their annual get together used to do just that. I have a few of their poetry chapbooks. The poets writings have been copy righted.
You know Edgar, I also have three chapbooks from one of the writers in the group I mentioned above. His chapbooks are called "Larry Sez" (jokes) by Glotheri, he is from Canada. Glo, as I called him copy righted his jokes. I also saw several long versions of his jokes posted in Letty's radio thread. Now I really wonder who they really belong to?
Shadows©
"Those lights!"
"They hurt so much!"
"No, lights cannot hurt you, Tom"
"I know they hurt, I can feel them."
"Tom, you cannot feel the light either."
"Yes!! I CAN!!! Get them away from me."
"Let's go for a walk, away from the lights"
As they walked away from the lights, Tom wanted to run toward the lights. Cowering down as if to hide in plain view, Tom ducked and darted around constantly, trying to get away from the invisible villains pursuing him. He was quite annoying as a young unruly child could be taxing upon a parent exasperated by attempts to calm the fractious antics.
The building's ledge seemed as confining as a prison allowing no escape as Tom's eyes frantically searched every window, every door, and every dark corner to find an escape. Was his eyes playing tricks on him or was there a wire fence above the outer wall? Although the building appeared to be normal and quiet, the lights came screaming from each window as they passed by them penetrating into the darkness.
"I am in prison?" Tom asked with a trembling voice.
"No, you may leave this place any time you wish."
The softness of the voice made him wonder if it were real or had he imagined it. Fear had taken hold of him and he wondered at the sincerity of everyone he encountered. Who could he trust anymore since that day? Surely, they were trying to kill him by now, but they wanted him to suffer as long as possible.
"That was what it was!" Tom whispered to himself.
As they walked in the dark of night with the lights of the city sparkling as fallen stars, Tom kept glancing as if not wanting it known he was studying the companion walking with him. He was tall and stood upright as if he could not feel the pain of the lights. He walked with sure steps as if he knew the ground would not move. Doesn't he know? Doesn't he know that nothing is sure? Tom could not trust the incontestable manner of this tall, over bearing man no matter how friendly he exuded himself to be. Tom felt sure he must be a prisoner and this must be the constable passing judgment over his fate.
"Who are you?" Tom demanded trying to form a voice of authority, though he knew he failed to sound even remotely like man. Now his gaze was direct and purposefully at the man who continued to walk as if no threat of Tom's could stir him. Tom questioned in his mind, "Is this man mocking me, making fun of me as if I am of no importance; does he think he is above wrong?"
"My name is Paul," was the simple and soft answer without loss of dignity in supremacy.
"Paul?" Tom asked with certain sarcasm.
"Just Paul?" he asked again before giving time for any reply.
"Yes."
"I don't believe you!"
"It will not change it, whether you believe it or not. My name is Paul."
Tom could not find anything else to respond to this situation and went back to searching for an escape. Suddenly, he looked over the edge of the wall. To his delight, he could see they were not high in the sky as he had thought. The wall seemed to become graveled stones forming steps away from the building.
"Look! Steps!" he exclaimed.
"Be careful! Your eyes may deceive you." Paul warned.
Tom did not want to hear anyone telling to be careful again in his life. He had always ignored warnings because he knew he could do anything his heart desired. As he entered the darkness, the steps turned to nothing. Yet, he entered the outside darkness without harm. Proudly, he stood erect and boasted to Paul of his defiant escape from the lights coming from the windows.
Suddenly, colorful lights began to dance around him. Frantic, he ran one way, then back, then another and back. He continued to run from the lights, yet he ran towards lights as if he could hide in the one thing that was killing him. Raising his hand to shield his face from the lights, he cowered down under them as if he were being pulled inside his own shadow.
Paul stood as he watched and observed. Paul carried a little notebook around taking notes and observing as if he were searching for the same thing that Tom was running from. As Tom ran towards the dark corner of the stones escaping the light's painful darkness, Paul calmly walked towards them. Paul became so absorbed in the search of the cause, he forgot about Tom momentarily.
The lights were dancing about an old building left to decay in the silent oasis in which it stood. As Paul approached the chaotic debris that once held the gaiety of life, he noticed a most gruesome sight. In all his control and calmness, he felt a little twinge of fear. All his wisdom from scholarly conditioning could not help him now as he approached the oddity found within this chaos.
There on the floor
.no
within the floor protruding out was a strange and gruesome hand with seven long fingers with long black finger nails. It appeared to be covered in fresh blood. Paul began gently wiping away the blood as if he knew it could feel his touch.
Suddenly, the hand began to move as it was dried from the blood. Paul was not afraid of this as it was not his. He reached down and held the hand almost as if he were consoling it. The hand began to emerge from the floor until a complete body was standing before him. The grotesque shape was every bit as gruesome as the hand.
Compassion for it though did not diminish as Paul began to quickly dry the blood from the remaining portions of its body. The being appeared to be female yet lacked a face as if it were there, but could not be seen. She had an unusually powerful magic about her. She could cause fear, dread, and shame. Her powers were relentless and even in the dark, she was there. Yet, she was gentle and loving with equally powerful forces even in the lights.
Feeling a sense of accomplishment, Paul relaxed his search as if he had finally found the source of Tom's fear and work could begin to remove it. But, where had Tom gone? Tom had escaped into the shadows of the darkness where no lights could find him. He had withdrawn deeper into the night and stolen away to privately rediscover his secret.
What seemed like hours, Tom finally arrived at the abandoned building where he found its eeriness comforting as it was familiar to him. He found the equipment still in the locker where he left it. Without making any noise, he began to put the diver's suit and heavy-weighted shoes on without thought. He had done this so many times; it was as if he could do it in his sleep.
Finally, he put the diver's mask on and attached the air tanks. Strangely enough, when he walked he could hear no steps, but at least now he could not feel the pain of the lights as he was completely within the shadows. He walked out to the deep pool within the rocks. Walking beneath the water, he could breathe, yet he felt no breath. Approaching the barrels hidden deep within this watery grave, he looked upon them with surety that they were safe and undiscovered.
He looked at the dials upon the top and seeing that all was well, he gently caressed them as if they were his friends. Suddenly, the dials began to bleed a blackness that seeped through the glass covering. Panic rose in his heart. He tried to scream, yet silence is all he heard. He tried to run, but the heavy shoes upon his feet weighted him down. As he emerged from the pool, he could see he had safely escaped the black blood, but where was everyone? The world around him was barren and stony without life. Had he truly escaped?
Frantically removing the mask and tanks and the heavy shoes, he began running from place to place calling to anyone who would respond. He began to cry not caring if anyone seen his manhood slipping away. He did not want to be alone in this empty darkness, this fear.
Through the cloudiness of his tears, he saw a door opening in the old warehouse. He ran towards it feeling like he was running on ground that moved away from him. Finally, he was standing before the door. Trembling with fear of what he would find on the other side, he reached and opened the door.
There she stood. Her eyes were piercing and bright as stars. He could see her face. The blood covering her strange grotesque body was bright against the darkness he embraced. He stood there crying a most bitter cry as he recognized who she was, but most strangely, he began to recognize who he was as if he were gazing into a mirror.
The compunction was more than he could bear. He collapsed to his knees and crying without control, she showed no pity upon him as her eyes burned into his heart.
"Where is everyone?" He begged.
The eyes continued to burn him with light.
"Where is this place?" He demanded to know.
The eyes continued to become brighter until he could see no more.
"Where is this place?" He desperately begged to know.
The being finally spoke with a soft and deadly answer.
"Your heart!!" She spoke as her eyes of stars became too intense to bear any longer.
His heart stopped beating and he died.
Fear mingled with grief of Tom's death within his pragmatic smugness that Paul prided himself so coldly. Paul felt superior in his own pureness until he faced the eyes of the face he could now see with stars for eyes burning his heart with shame. He knew he had failed and even though the darkness of Tom's heart was overpoweringly deadly, he discovered the darkness within his own heart was far greater and he soon became swallowed by his own shadow.
An intriguing tale. It kept me wondering to the end.
A memory of Isis
Unlike "the woman in the red dress",
Sheena is wearing jeans.
A pale blue shirt and nothing on her feet.
As she moves around my kitchen,
sniffing herbs and reading labels,
I chop vegetables
and tell her everything I know about classical music
(which isn't a lot).
She listens with good grace
while I stumble over composers,
babbling about 'The Blue Danube'
and nearly chopping my finger off
whilst muttering over Mozart.
Pretending to read the ingrediances
listed on a cold tube of tomato puree,
I search my brain
for something wise to say.
While she watches me patently,
twirling a mint leaf under her nose.
My mouth speaks
without waiting
to be cleared for Go.
"So, you're a classic pianist."
I remind her,
(yet again).
She nods, smiling.
Relaxed. Looking
like a stoned bass player I once knew.
"What are you making?" She wonders, suddenly.
Asking gently.
"Well...I don't know."
She laughs with pleasure
and then we part,
Woman turning
away
back through the arch,
towards a stack of CDs
I watch her
standing there with her back to me.
Elbows bent, head on one side
Reading the spines
of my music collection.
I look down at a bright red pepper
and begin slicing,
chopping,
faster, remembering
my hidden collection
of John Williams compositions.
I listen to Sheena speaking names:
Gorecki, The Clash, Public Enemy,
Aphex Twin, The Prodigy, Carl Orff,
...until I can shut out her words
and concentrate on a garlic bulb.
"Here." She's back in the kitchen.
A small cd collection
fanned out in her hands.
"Pick a track from each of these," she offers,
showing me first Bob Dylan's 'Desire'.
"Isis."
Spoken instinctively,
before I've even run the list of songs
through my head.
She nods, puts the CD to one side.
"This?"
And so we go on, from selection process
to Isis.
To dinner.
And then to bed.
Where I dream of Isis.
Patient as the earth.
A May bride,
waiting for me in the meadow.
Its 5 in the morning (here in the uk) and it needs work, but not as much as i need sleep).
endymion
That's an interesting treatment. Vivid and charming.
That's very kind of you, edgerblythe.
It's a bit of a shock to read it in the cold (sober) light of day.
Herema, nicely construed story. Where are you going to submit it?
Thanks Spidergal,
I am not submitting it anywhere because it is already in my book, "Embraced by the Wind, The Incomplete Works," published by Publish America. Even though I wrote it, it still intrigues me each time I read it. The symbolism worked its way as the words formed on the paper almost as if they wrote themselves. Being a writer is closest to insanity I have ever experienced.......and I LOVE IT!!!!
Edymion....I love your writing style. You write enough to give our imaginations a great vivid picture while leaving enough for us to create our own images through personal experiences. The magnetic pull of emotions ranging from awkwardness, new love, passion, hunger, desire, and laughter at ourselves at having these same emotions have been expressed by your writing. Very nicely written.
