Thanksgiving

It was our first Thanksgiving together.  A Human holiday I'd never particularly identified with... until now.  I sat at the dining room table with a glass of 30 year old whiskey, neat, and silently watched all the chaos around me.

Rain was in the kitchen bouncing between the stove, the sink and the counter; slicing, shopping, stirring.  An occasional stop by the oven to check on the turkey and she started the circuit all over again.  Lily moved around on her own busy trajectory, the two of them managing somehow to never be in each other's way.

The back door stood open and the warm autumn California sunshine came in on a sweet breeze.  Glancing outside I took a moment to appreciate the roses and cannas that were still blooming thanks to a long summer.  The sky was gradient blue; milky to saturated in its transitioning shades and a faint smear of clouds kissed the horizon.

The sound of laughter brought my gaze back to the kitchen where Drason was chopping carrots, apparently incorrectly, and Rain was teasing him about it.  Kheelan stood leaning against the wall between the kitchen and living room, his feet crossed at the ankle as he popped cashews into his mouth.

Rain had moved to the sink and was washing her knife, laughing at something Kheelan said and flicking water at him from her fingertips.  He made his way to her in two long strides and wrapped his arms around her, pinning hers to her sides so he could wet one hand and return her splashes, making her giggle.

I couldn't help but smile as I watched Kheelan change his hold on her, his arms relaxing from playful imprisonment to an affectionate embrace.  He pressed several kisses to her cheek before Rain turned her head to claim a quick kiss on the mouth.

Now.  Now I understood the holiday and it had nothing to do with the pilgrims, Indians or food, it was the people who made it special.

Kheelan, my best friend since childhood, had never given up on me all the years I was gone from Faerie.  And Rain, the one of a kind woman who brought me to life long before she broke my curse.

Rain met my gaze and looked a question at me which I answered with a smile.  I watched as she came around the island, drying her hands on a towel as she walked.  Arriving at my side I sat my glass down and wrapped my arms around her hips from where I sat, looking up into her beautiful face.

She stroked my hair before letting her hands rest on my shoulders, "Are you all right?" she asked, and her concern for me always warmed me to my bones.

I smiled up at her, "Yes la mia bellizza, I'm perfectly wonderful.  I promise." 

Want to know how I got these scars?

“Want to know how I got these scars?” Eric asked Amy who was nestled against him, her long fingers tracing the lines of the raised, rough tissue on his chest. 

Looking up from where her head was resting against his shoulder she smiled a languid, post sex smile and blinked slowly at him, “Sure.”

“Well, I was backpacking through Europe and when I was in Venice I had stopped in a café for some lunch.  Now mind you, I was traveling on a shoestring so lunch was nothing more than a bottle of water and a cheap sandwich from a corner mart, but I chose to eat it in San Marco Square just to make it feel fancier.”

Amy shifted her weight, propping her head up in her hand and leaning onto her elbow, her eyes losing some of their sleepiness as Eric spoke of faraway places she longed to visit.

“I was sitting on the ground against one of the pillars of the Doge’s palace, content to just watch the colorful collection of people passing by, most of who acted like they were the only people there.  They were so unaware of things going on around them and were accidentally rude to others they hadn’t bothered to notice were sharing the city with them.  It was both comical and annoying.”

It was Eric’s turn to shift, turning onto his side to face Amy, mimicking her head-propped-in-hand pose.

“But it was the three men in long black coats that caught and kept my attention.”

“Why?” Amy asked, her voice curious.

“Well, it was July in Venice, much too hot for the coats they were wearing.  Plus, they were walking really slowly and their heads were swiveling around in slow motion like they were looking for someone.  As it turned out they were looking for someone, a girl who didn’t look much older than 16, and when they saw her they made a synchronized beeline for her.”

Amy sat up, pulling a pillow into her lap and wrapping her arms around it, her posture tense.  “What did they do to her?” she asked, her eyes wide.

“I don’t know what they would have done, but their intent seemed sinister to I jumped up and made my way to the girl.  Fortunately I was closer so I was able to intercept her.”

“What did you do?”

Eric flipped back onto his back, lacing his fingers behind his head and crossing his feet at the ankle.  “I took her by the arm and started walking her out of the square.  I told her there were three men after her, but she said she knew that.  She told me they were sent by the mob, she had information they wanted and she was trying to stay in hiding.”

“What was the information?” Amy asked, leaning forward.

“I don’t know; we never got that far.  We heard the three men’s shoes on the stone sidewalk as they started running after us so we ran too.”

Eric sat up and crossed his legs, mimicking Amy by clutching a pillow in his lap, leaning in as he continued, “Venice is a twisty, labyrinthine city.  We tried to lose them in the alleyways and by hopping across rows of tethered gondolas, but we couldn’t shake them.  They finally caught up to us and tacked us both to the ground.  I couldn’t even see what was happening with the girl, I was too busy getting my ass kicked.  The guy who was pummeling me actually tried to end me, stabbing me three times and leaving me for dead.”

Amy pressed one hand over her mouth, stifling a gasp.

“When I woke up in the hospital I didn’t really have any information to give to the police since I never got the girl’s name.  I never knew what happened to her.”

“Oh God, Eric.  Really!?”

Eric smirked, “Nah, I got these when I fell into a barbed wire fence on my Uncle’s farm.”

Candy Man

They say the Candy Man can do anything.  He can sprinkle a sunrise with dew; he can take tomorrow and dip it in a dream, but what they don’t tell you is that the Candy Man can also steal your soul and turn it into a mind twisting confection.

Yeah, I wouldn’t have believed it either, not until ten years ago when I won that cursed golden ticket.  I’d thought all my dreams had come true!  My family was being taken care of and I was learning how to be a chocolatier from the genius behind Fizzy Lifting drink, the Everlasting Gobstopper and the gum that was a complete meal. 

I didn’t learn the truth for six years.

Saying Willy was eccentric was a monumental understatement, but then most genius’ are.  I was taking the Wonkivator to the Nut Room to check on the last batch of pecans we’d received but by accident I pushed two of the buttons at the same time; that simple slip of the finger would change my life.

I was whisked off to a part of the factory I’d never seen.  It was the opposite of everything else I’d seen, in place of the bright colors was black and gray, making me feel like I’d stepped into an old movie I didn’t have a script for.  I walked down the monochromatic hallway, the length of which was unbroken by a single door, it simply felt like a funnel leading me toward the unknown and I thought for sure the pounding of my heart would echo against the slick walls.

Reaching the partially open door at the end of the long hallway I peered through the narrow opening and couldn’t believe what I was seeing!  Willy had three children, no older then 5, sitting at a tiny table and he was having a tea party with them.  A miniature tea set was arranged on the table alongside pastries, cakes and cookies which the children were gobbling up as fast as they could get their hands on them, stuffing them into their chocolate smeared mouths.

As I watched he took one little girl by the hand and led her toward a small machine that sat in the far corner, the black metal of it nearly lost in the shadows.  I couldn’t hear what he was saying to her but with a nod she stepped up onto a box he had at the base of the contraption and bent forward to look into the brass eyepiece, much like the ones you find on a nickelodeon.

Willy started turning a small crank on the side of the machine with one hand, the other hand pressed to the back of her head to hold her in place.  With a pop and crackle sound the machine came to life, whirring and buzzing and after only a few moments the machine gave one last popping sound just as the little girl’s body went limp.  Willy stepped on a pedal hidden in the floor and a trap door opened under her feet, dropping her into a chute that I was certain led to the incinerator.

I was too shocked to move.  To scream.  To do anything more than continue to stare.

The two remaining children remained oblivious, far more interested in the sweets they were given than in wondering about their missing friend.  Reaching down Willy plucked a piece of candy from a slot just under the small crank, holding it up to the light and smiling at it a moment before popping it into his mouth.

He shuddered when the confection hit his tongue, rising up on his toes and spinning around in pirouettes with unrestrained giggling… like a little girl.  I couldn’t believe what I was seeing, couldn’t believe that Willy was stealing children’s essence, their souls, and I guessed that this was how he’d remained ageless.  I suspected too that this was also where his ideas for new candy came from, after all nothing is more creative than the unshackled imagination of a child.

When he turned and started skipping toward the two remaining children I knew I had to stop him, I had to save them, and with a sudden yell I burst through the door and ran at him.  I think I had hoped that being filled with a little girl’s essence he wouldn’t be able to react and process events like an adult; I was wrong.

Willy turned and his polluted gaze pinned me, almost stopping me in my tracks with the sinister intention behind his eyes but I barreled onward, dropping my shoulder to ram into him but he stepped to the side and instead of taking him down I experienced a painful encounter with the wall.  I fell backward and my head connected with the floor, soundly ringing my bell, and even when I felt Willy grab me I couldn’t react. 

I could feel myself being dragged across the room and felt the cold press of the brass eyepiece against my face and still I couldn’t get my limbs to respond.  I felt the machine pulling at me, pulling and sucking the very essence of me out through my eyes and my energy and spirit surged through the inner workings of the machine.  I spun, twirled, was mixed and beaten, pulled and pushed until I finally came to rest.

Willy’s fingers grabbed me, holding me up and I found myself looking back at him through the spun sugar wall of a piece of hard candy.  I could see my body lying at his feet and watched as he opened the trap door and let it fall into the incinerator, now he could make up any story he wanted to explain to my parents why I wasn’t ever coming back.  Shit.

As he sat me on the top of the machine to give me a full view of the room his voice was eerily calm, chiding me, “You can just stay here now and watch, Charlie, that’s what you get for being naughty.”

Draven's Nightmare

Draven sat propped up against the thick base of an elm tree, his legs folded and The Diplomat resting in his lap like a favorite cat. He snuggled deeper into the dark blue cloak Eva had had made for him, the heavy wool warm and comforting as though it was Eva who was wrapped around him, and he sighed contentedly as his fingers caressed the embroidered words along the edge: It’s an adventure.

His eyelids felt heavy and each blink lasted longer and longer until he finally lost the battle with sleep. It was Soviel’s turn to stand watch so it wasn’t that kind of fear that made him fight the Sandman so hard; it was the risk that his recurring nightmare would plague him. It wasn’t a nightly event, which is what made it so difficult; Draven didn’t know when to expect the horrifying images that his mind conjured up to torment him.

At first his mind was blissfully blank, only the curtain of sleep separating him from the waking world as was his preference, but in one quick moment that curtain was ripped aside and he stared at the same scene he’d seen dozens of time over the last year.

Eva and her father stood arguing with each other on the precipice of a high cliff that loomed over a turbulent sea, fingers pointing and voices shouting. They wielded their words like weapons, sharp, pointed and with each verbal lash cuts opened all over their bodies, bleeding their clothes red. Draven stood and watched helplessly, having tried time and again in the past to intervene, to protect Eva, to save their child but in this scene he was a ghost.

Draven’s blue eyes watched through a searing haze of red rage as Lord Townsend grabbed Eva by the throat, his long fingers squeezing until her flesh bulged between his fingers like warm dough. Her face turned pink and then red and then purple as she clawed at his hands, wrists and arms in an unsuccessful attempt to gain her freedom.

Eva’s feet dangled just above the ground and she took advantage of her position, drawing one leg back as far as she could before swinging it forward with all her might, the tip of her booted foot connecting solidly with her father’s groin and he dropped her as he doubled over and took his turn to fight for breath. Eva continued to scream down at him, her hands protectively covering her swollen belly as tears of blood streamed down her face, staining the alabaster perfection of her skin.

Lord Townsend drew himself up onto his hands and knees, lifting his head and pinning his daughter with a poison stare and quick as a snake strike he thrust his hands into Eva’s abdomen, pulling her to the ground as his fingers ripped and tore her flesh to reach the half-breed child she carried. Eva’s screams were ones of pain, loss and hatred and despite the wash of blood that stained the ground and the spill of her insides across her own lap she continued to fight.

With all she had left Eva wrenched their child from her father’s murderous grasp before hammering both feet into his chest and sending him over the edge of the cliff to the sharp rocks below. Draven moved to kneel beside his love where she lay gutted and dying, their child dead in her arms, its cord still connecting mother to child and as usual he awoke when she died.

Draven's Love

Draven sat on a smooth granite boulder that was more than half buried in the earth, leaning back against the fencepost that butted against the stone and taking a rare break from his chores. Since his brothers had left more of the work had fallen to him and he had much less time to goof off, but he knew his family wouldn’t begrudge him a few stolen moments. His thick fingers were surprisingly nimble as he braided sections of his beard idly, twisting the thick hairs to bind the ends of the braids.

His mind drifted into a stream of consciousness that led him from one memory of Eva to another, her laugh and her smile. Her warm whiskey colored eyes, her honey and strawberry scent, the feel of her in his arms. She was his first love, a human noble who had stopped at the Darius farm to have her sister’s mare re-shod and their first encounter had ended with her pinning him to the ground under her knee.

In spite of the training she’d already obviously had, Eva had asked him to teach her how to fight, she didn’t like relying on others to protect her and Draven was only too happy to teach her what he knew. She’d taken to dual wielding short swords like a duck to water, which suited her petite frame, barely an inch taller than him, and she was a quick study in hand to hand as well. Draven closed his eyes and recalled their sparring matches, a smile quirking the corners of his mouth at the thought of how many of those matches ended in a hot and sweaty tumble in their secret meadow.

They were an unusual pair, human and dwarf, noble and farmer, and yet they complimented each other as rain did spring. Neither of their families knew about their relationship, they’d surely frown on it for any number of reasons, but the idea of being without Eva caused them both physical pain so they held their secret close.

Draven heard footsteps and his eyes opened to find Lord Townsend looming over him, Eva’s father, and his heart lurched into his throat. The human was very tall, towering over Draven at six foot four and staring down his narrow nose at him, his gray eyes cold and menacing.

“Dwarf,” he began in a low voice that was just as cold as his eyes. “You shame my house with your low and shabby self. You dare to lay your hands on my daughter, to violate her and steal her maidenhead, making her useless to me.”

With every poisonous word Lord Townsend spoke Draven found his frame vibrating more and more with fury, his hands fisted at his sides.

“And now, to add insult to injury, your filthy seed has taken root inside her traitorous belly.”

Draven felt the blood drain from his face. “Eva is pregnant?” Hearing the word out loud didn’t make it feel any more real, he had to see her, had to get her away from her toxic father and without waiting for Lord Townsend to utter another word Draven hopped up onto the boulder and launched himself at the man, swinging one meaty fist and landing a solid blow that laid the human out.

Running the five paces to Lord Townsend’s horse he pulled himself into the saddle and dug his heels into the animal’s sides, sending the stallion lurching forward. The 20 minute run into town felt like an hour, scenery passing in what felt like slow motion until finally Draven pulled the horse to a sliding halt in front of Eva’s house, leaping from the saddle and running through the front door.

“Eva! Eva!” Draven called out to her and was only met with the screams of scared servants. Bolting up the stairs he looked up and down the long second floor hallway, his blue eyes locking on a matronly figure blocking the farthest door. Turning to his right he ran at her and with a shriek she pressed herself to the wall, allowing Draven to throw the door open where he found… nothing.

It was clear that this was Eva’s room; her clothes lay scattered across the floor, spilling from an open armoire and her scent still hung in the air, as familiar to him as his own, but the room was empty. It was when he noticed the toppled furniture that his heart rate doubled, she’d been taken by force, but to where? Spinning on his heel he marched to the woman cowering in the hall, clutching her dress in an iron grip and she raised her hands in a feeble attempt to ward him off.

“Where is she?!” His voice was like thunder, loud and demanding her attention but she seemed incapable of speaking instead of wailing and Draven pushed her away in frustration, storming out of the house and making his way home on foot.

That evening he told his family over dinner that he was leaving, he told them of his love for Eva and his need to find her and their child and the support he’d hoped for, that he’d counted on, was there in abundance.

Dawn found him on the road, The Diplomat strapped to his back and a small satchel of food and clothes slung over one shoulder. In spite of his worry and his fears about Eva there was a spring in his step, and memories of her touch and her easy laughter kept his spirit light and hopeful, after all as she always said: It’s an adventure.

Karic Asani

The moon was full, hanging heavy and pregnant against the star speckled sky of the October night, its eerie silver light glancing across the landscape like a skipped stone. The winter air was crisp, freezing any water it could find and turning fields of grass into glittering carpets of blue white crystals by dawn. Evergreen needles donned thin robes of ice and the banks of the river had started to fan outward with thin icy fingers, one side reaching for the other like long separated lovers.

Karic huddled inside his heavy woolen cloak, the deep hood pulled up to shield his face from the biting wind and his azure eyes stared intently from the dark recess at the two shadowed figures in the distance. A milky fog was struggling its way into existence, wafting upward in thin tendrils that wrapped around his legs and Karic didn’t know whether to blame the fog or what he was seeing for keeping him rooted to the spot.

He and Winter had been recruited into the Althinians at the same time but hadn’t actually met until eight years into their training, finding themselves assigned the same target, and the assignment instantly became a contest. Their methods were both similar and different, having received the same training; however they each had their own preferences. Karic liked his bullets to only stun his targets, enabling him to move in for a close up kill while Winter preferred the quick and clean from a distance approach.

Another two years passed in friendship and camaraderie, yet with each passing day Karic noticed more and more that he was looking at his friend with different eyes, was seeing him in a new light. Fear gripped him at the thought of being rejected, of being brushed off or completely losing Winter and that fear lodged in his throat like a fist. Karic could recall in perfect detail the moment that fear was proven to be unnecessary, the moment when in his rash, impulsive way Winter had pulled him under the sheltering arms of a willow and pressed a kiss to his lips.

Karic let two years’ worth of memories play through his mind while he watched Winter now, two years of passion and laughter and quiet intimate moments. And now Winter held a woman in his arms, his cloak encasing their bodies as they kissed passionately, the sounds of their desire and hunger for each other being carried on the wind to Karic’s ears and he flinched as though wounded. The wind brought him her name, whispered in Winter’s velvety voice, and with that name was born in Karic a burning sense of betrayal. Lyna. Another Althinian.

He didn’t want to see any more. Didn’t want to hear any more. Turning on his heel Karic made his way into the night, his heart hammering in his chest, the broken pieces beating against his sternum like trapped birds with each step he took toward the Althinian compound.

Their confrontation was ugly; aren’t they always? Blame and guilt, pain and sadness, anger and loss. Winter tried to explain, to make Karic understand, but he wouldn’t hear it. Karic couldn’t bear the thought of Winter loving someone else, and with each word from his lover’s lips he felt his pain and hurt turn to anger and hate.

Days later Karic was promoted in the wake of their leader’s death, taking up the mantel of ruling the Althinians and under the façade of a finely woven lie his first official order was to kill Winter and Lyna.

They ran.

For two years Karic’s agents tracked them, trailed them and hounded them across continents; always a step behind until at last they were found hiding in a small unassuming village a month’s travel from home. The report was finally delivered in person by those who had killed Winter; they shared every detail of the final chase, of the beating they had meted out on him and of the killing blow. They described the sound of breaking bones and the smell of his blood. They explained that the woman had escaped but they would continue to hunt her.

Karic waved them away.

Standing at his window he stared out across the icy landscape beyond the glass, his mind trying to process all that he’d been told and presenting him with an image of Winter’s gruesomely beaten, broken and bloodied body lying abandoned in some far away foreign land. With a sudden wave of nausea he pushed the window open and retched onto the lower roof, his eyes watering and his knees going weak as he lay doubled over the windowsill.

Never again would he allow anyone get that close; in that moment, with the knowledge that Winter was dead, he refused to feel this kind of pain ever again. The betrayal he’d harbored for two years, that he’d nurtured and fed with the memory of his lover’s lips on someone else’s flesh, hardened into a protective skin that no one would ever get under.

Bubbles

“Please?”

“Questions!? No questions!”

“Really, bro?”

“Seriously, sis. I said no!”

“Tell me why!”

“Usually mom deals with this crap!”

“Very funny, you know mom is dead.”

“Why are you asking me for this now? We’re adults!?”

“Xanthippe! That’s who you always said I was.”

“Yes, you can be.”

“Zero risk here, bro.”

“Again with your persistence! You know I hate them.”

“Baffling!”

“Come on, you know the potential risk!”

“Damn you, bro! Get over it!”

“Enough! This is ridiculous.”

“Finally, you see reason.”

“Go away then, I don’t want to see them!”

“How can you let this be a big deal!?”

“I hate them even if you don’t, always have!”

“Just watch; be careful with them and all will be well.”

“Keep them over there then.”

“Least you can do is trust me to handle them with care.”

“Mom showed you how to do it?”

“Not going to abandon you no matter how messy it may get.”

“Open the bubble bottle.”

Diamonds on her wrist and whiskey on her tongue

It was a perfectly extravagant moment, she was aware of this on every level. The view. The music. Her surroundings. Her dress. All of it, excessive and extravagant.

The gunmetal silk of her simply designed dress clung to her in all the right places and felt like an angel’s whisper against her skin; the span between the narrow straps suspending a cascade of black and silver beads that draped down her bare back, moving and sparking in the warm moonlight. An almost touchable breeze blew across her arms and legs, inconstant and tantalizing as a lover’s teasing fingertips and the sensation brought a secret smile to her burgundy lips.

Her long ebony hair was swept up into a loose pile of curls and waves, creamy gardenias and diamond pins scattered through the heavy mass, the scent intoxicating and she was happy to be taking this moment in the center of such a heady cloud. Strains of Spanish influenced guitar accompanied by a violin wafted through the crowd, weaving through and wrapping around bodies and minds, lulling and seducing with the pull of a bow and the pluck of a sting.

She leaned against the low wall that edged the balcony, smoked glass and bright chrome, a heavy cut crystal glass dangling from her polished fingertips as her smoke gray eyes drank in the view of the valley at her feet.

This was one of those moments. Everything was perfect. The music, the location, the feel of the air; this time and place could never be duplicated and she was acutely aware of its perfection and yet she didn’t feel the need to try to hold onto it. She was content to let it hold her, and hold it briefly in return.

Turning around she leaned back against the low wall, closing her eyes and letting herself completely soak in this perfect bite of life with diamonds on her wrist and whiskey on her tongue.

No Good Story Start With a Salad

My bare feet struck the pavement and sent jolts of pain from my heels straight up my shinbones, the sensation rattling around the underside of my kneecaps like a copper bell clapper. The oxygen I gulped into my lungs burned like napalm, feeling thick and sticky in my throat, coating my mouth and sinuses. I didn’t know where my would-be assailant was, I couldn’t hear their feet pounding the asphalt behind me or any heavy breathing in my wake, but I wasn’t fool enough to think they had given up their pursuit, not after what I’d already seen them do.

It had been a normal day, nothing out of the ordinary had happened at all, and if someone had told me when I woke up that by lunchtime I’d be running for my life I’d have thought them insane. Now I had to question my own sanity; had I really seen that woman sprout wings and fly? Surely not. But I thought… could she have… it’s not possible… was it?

I’d just finished paying for my Caesar salad and was making my way through the cafeteria toward the table where my coworkers Beth and Carrie were waiting for me, and the sudden appearance of a tall raven-haired woman in my path brought me up short. I’d stared up into the depths of her mink brown eyes, marveling at the gold and copper flecks that almost seemed to sparkle in the pale fluorescent lighting and I found I was stunned into silence for a moment at the remarkable beauty of her.

Five foot eight with legs for days that sprouted from the hem of a cherry red dress drew the attention of almost everyone in the room and all conversation faded into silence, all eyes watching her. She had honeyed golden skin and full breasts that the seemed to be contained by the plunging neckline of her dress as if by magic, the enticing expanse of skin drawing my gaze for a span of heartbeats before I met her eyes again.

She stepped closer to me, taking my lunch tray and handing it off without looking, just knowing someone would take it from her and when I moved to take a step back out of natural ‘personal space’ instinct her hands shot out and gripped my shoulders, pulling me against the length of her curvaceous body. Her voice was low when she spoke, a whisper like dark promises of ecstasy, the sound making my mind slip sideways and completely forget about the large audience we had accumulated.

“You’re the one,” she said softly, “You’re the one I’ve been looking for.”

It was when I realized that her body didn’t feel hot against mine that a warning bell started going off in my head, a woman like this should have been generating enough heat to bake bread but instead she was cold, her skin radiating a chill that penetrated my knit shirt and broke my arms out in goose bumps. I again tried to move away but her long fingers were like steel, her nails digging into the flesh of my arms almost painfully as she spoke again, lowering her head so I felt her lips moving against mine as she spoke.

“It’s painless, Julie, a small price for endless payoff.”

I had no idea what she was talking about but each word felt like it was pulling at my core, a thin silken thread tugging at something rooted inside me and the sensation brought my fight or flight instinct to life. With every ounce of will power I could muster I managed to remain calm, trying to lull her info a sense of victory; I brought my hands up slowly, sliding them across her stomach, over her ribs, brushing the sides of her breasts before coming to rest on her chest and with a small inhale I shoved for all I was worth.

She teetered on feet I was surprised to see were bare, her toenails polished a bright red, and when she stumbled backwards I turned and ran. I heard her come after me almost immediately, her feet slapping the tiled cafeteria floor, and in an effort to slow her down I grabbed the large bowl of lettuce from the salad bar as I ran past it, turning and hurling it at her. She batted it aside but the fact that I’d thrown something at her seemed to genuinely shock her; and then she was angry about it.

I could feel the air thicken, coalescing around her and she became buoyant in the heavy mass, her feet rising slowly off the floor. When the pearlescent wings of semi-transparent light erupted from her back I didn’t wait around to see any more, I turned and ran, letting my sandals fall away almost unnoticed as I bolted out the front door of my office and down the crowded streets of mid-town.

And now here I was, being chased by Gods knew what, and the massive stitch in my side finally forced me to stop. I ducked into a narrow alley and fought to catch my breath as quietly as I could, pressing the heel of one hand into my ribs in an effort to relieve the pain in my side. My feet ached and my clothes were wet with sweat, my hair disheveled and my mind still racing.

When she materialized in front of me I realized my mistake, the narrow alley I’d hoped would have been small enough to go unnoticed by her was also too small for me to maneuver within; I’d effectively trapped myself.

With the speed of a whip strike she grabbed my wrists and bent them behind the small of my back, leaning her body into mine and using our weight to pin them there. Extracting one of her hands she reached up and cradled my face against her palm, threading her fingers into my hair and tilting my head back. Was she a vampire I wondered, even while realizing how absurd that sounded, but what other explanation was there?

“I’m not here to hurt you, Julie,” she said in that silken purring voice. “I’m here to help you. To heal you.”

Without any warning she pressed her mouth to mine, her lips soft yet demanding and the pressure of her tongue parted my own lips and let her slip inside. She tasted of wine and roses, honeyed pears and nectar, and the sensation of her exploration sapped the fight from me. I again felt that tugging deep at my core, something pulling and yanking and the feeling instantly changed from odd to painful as whatever she was pulling on was ripped free.

She stepped back suddenly, doubling over while deep coughs wracked her frame. After a few moments she grew silent, her breathing gone soft, and as she straightened up I looked down at the black, gnarled mass resting in the palm of her hand. It smelled of death and decay and I wrinkled my nose at it.

“This is the cancer that was growing in your heart.”

Her words felt like a blow to my chest! What had just happened? I was trembling and with a strange gesture the black mass disappeared and she gently took my hands, her touch strangely warm and soothing now. She shushed me when I opened my mouth to speak, a smile curving her lips, “Don’t squander this chance. Live loud and passionately and regret nothing.” And with those parting words she was gone.

I glanced around the empty alleyway, my now healthy heart hammering in my chest, my world view forever altered and I started laughing almost hysterically, speaking out loud to myself as I made my way slowly back to work, “Whoever said no good story starts with salad was wrong.”

Exhausted

His sword was heavy, feeling twice its normal weight as gravity fought to pull it from his tired hands.  The muscles in his shoulders and legs ached and burned, his back screaming in pain while his head continued to ring like a bell from the last three strikes to his helmet.

A sea of bodies stretched as far as he could see, lying quiet in some places while in others still swelling slightly with the final breaths of the dying.  The air felt thick and the metallic scent of blood coated his mouth, overpowering the fragrance of damp earth, which was typically found across the countryside.

His brown eyes scanned the vast battlefield, verifying that all his opponents had been defeated while at the same time taking in the number of his own men he lost in the process.  The number was staggering.

Since he was old enough to hold a sword he’d been trained to be a warrior; sword and shield and staff and bow, these were the tools of his craft and he had become a master, an artist of death.  His body bore the scars where his enemy had exploited a weakness or pressed an advantage, and yet he still always emerged the victor, his bloody face the last thing the dying men saw before shrugging off their mortal coil.

And here he stood again, the triumphant battle master, and yet now he had no desire to hold his bloodied sword aloft and cry out in victory.  He took no pride in the fact that he had survived and won, that the Duke he served would again shower him with money and gifts; he just didn't see the value of it anymore.

Raising his eyes he looked past the expanse of bodies, up to the horizon and the fringe of trees that seemed to beckon him like a siren beckoned sailors, but in their silhouette he didn't see his demise but rather his rebirth.  A thought of a life of violence and endless warmongering felt like iron armor, heavy and oppressive and smothering and suddenly he couldn't breathe.

Reaching up with one blood caked hand he frantically pulled his helmet off, dropping the elaborately crafted metal into the mud and gasping for air, filling his lungs to capacity in spite of the metallic taste.  Taking one shaky step forward he let his sword fall to the ground, fumbled with the leather straps that held his chest and back plates in place until they too fell.  Piece by piece he stripped his armor away as he staggered, half ran, half stumbled and occasionally crawled over the dead and dying toward the distant tree line.

As his last greave clattered to the ground he collapsed to his knees at the base of a huge pine tree, his bloodied hands clinging to it as he might to a long lost lover, his cheek pressed to the rough bark and he expelled a shaky breath.  Pushing himself to his feet he moved deeper into the forest’s embrace, exhausted but finally truly alive.

Gypsy

Standing among the press of gawkers who always seem to gather at crime scenes, all of them thinking better them than me; one pair of emerald eyes watched the activity of the police as they walked around, appearing to have no purpose other than to distract the on-lookers from the victim’s sheet draped body. A light drizzle of rain fell from the night sky, shimmering in the light of the nearly full moon and coating everything in fine dew.

She watched him crouch down by the body, lifting the sheet that clung damply to the cold flesh he looked up at the others standing nearby, motioning angrily at the body he dropped and sheet and stood. Stepping toward a plain clothes officer, he jabbed his finger into the man’s chest to punctuate each bitten off word, forcing the officer backward. With a final word he turned and stormed away, the wet leather of his jacket giving off steam from the heat of the body within.

She watched the exchange and her gaze followed his progress across the parking lot and into the black Camero, its tires slipping for a moment on the slick pavement before the rubber got traction and launched the car into the night. She made her way through the crowd, having to push people aside with her elbows; and she walked up the street in the direction the car had gone.

At midnight on a Thursday the streets were relatively deserted, making it easier to follow the tracks left by the Camero. Shoving her hands into the pockets of her jeans, she kept her eyes on the tire tracks and walked into the wind, squinting again the swirling drizzle. After several blocks she spotted the car parked at an angle in front of a small bar, the red and blue neon signs reflecting on the black paint; and she couldn’t help but smile. That didn’t take long she thought, crossing the street and pushing the thin door open. Pausing a moment for her eyes to adjust to the dim interior, she scanned the occupant’s faces until her gaze locked on the hunched, leather clad shoulders in the far corner.

Pausing on her way by, she spoke softly to the tall, thin man behind the bar and waited while he poured two drinks and set them in front of her. Dropping a twenty on the sticky wooden bar, she took the glasses and walked casually across the room, her hips swaying to the rhythm of Michael Buble’s version of Moondance on the jukebox.

Setting the glass of whiskey down in front of him brought his head up suddenly and he spun around, angry brown eyes meeting the calm green of hers as she sank into the chair opposite him. He stared at her, the dew drops on her lashes and in her dark red hair catching the neon light like tiny prisms, giving the effect of jewels. Her cheeks were pink from the cold and a thin sheen of dampness clung to her skin like she’d just emerged from a sauna. His gaze roamed down her long neck to the deep V of her white button down shirt, the thin cotton material clinging to her and the sight of it brought his mind back to the sheet draped victim he’d seen only half an hour ago and his eye brows came together in a scowl.

“Go away. I’m in no mood for a quickie in the bathroom.” He snapped. Becoming even more irritated when she smiled at him, stirring the ice cubes around in her own glass with the tip of one finger. He watched as she raised that finger to her mouth and wrapped her lips around if, sucking the whiskey off her skin.

“I said, go away. I don’t have the extra cash anyway.” His voice was a deep growl and the sound of his frustration made her smile even wider. Rising from her seat, she placed her hands flat on the table and leaned toward him, forcing him to lean back to meet her eyes.

“Dance with me.” Her husky voice was like warm honey and several heads turned. The song on the jukebox ended and she walked over to it, dropping a quarter into the slot and making her selection. Turning back, her eyes made it clear that she was not going to leave him alone until she got her way. Frank Sinatra’s voice crooned out The Way You Look Tonight as she moved back toward him, stopping right in front of him and reaching down to push the heavy leather coat off of his broad shoulders.

His breath was coming too fast and he tried to slow it down, taking a deep lungful of air and letting it out slowly as she stood in front of him. Rising to his feet he expected her to step back but she stayed firmly planted and his body bumped hers. Placing one arm around her waist he took her hand as she wrapped her arm across his shoulders and they began moving together. He could feel all the eyes in the bar on them and normally he would have hated that feeling, but at the moment he couldn’t find it in him to care. Her eyes never left his and neither of them spoke; only the music and the feel of their bodies pressed together existed and the three minute song seemed to go on and on. The silence that fell when the song ended was like being doused in cold water and he tried to step away but she refused to release him, her arm holding him against her while she reached into her shirt pocket and withdrew a business card. Holding it up for him to see, she slid it into his back pocket as she leaned into him, pressing her lips to his in a chaste kiss.

Leaning back she looked into his eyes and saw the confusion there and whispered against his ear, “I know who killed her.” He jerked away as though she had burned him. Without a single look back she made her way across the bar and out the door before he could think again and grabbing his coat he ran after her. Erupting through the front door into the steady rain that had started to fall, he scanned the area and found no trace of her.

Raking his fingers through his hair he sighed and unlocked his car, dropping in behind the wheel. Digging in his back pocket he pulled out the card that she had given him, staring at the dark red lettering which read Gypsy. Starting the car, he put it in gear and drove toward home; unaware of the green eyes that watched from the shadows.

Joy

Heaven still meant something. Didn’t it? It had to, to believe anything else was to acknowledge that the day to day drudgery of mundane sameness was all there was, and that was too unpleasant a thought to entertain. Yes, there were moments of joy, elation, ecstasy and genuine happiness, but they were fleeting and vastly outnumbered by stress, fatigue, apathy, depression, anger, hatred, jealousy… the list went on and on and the scales felt unevenly tipped.

The idea of heaven gave people something to strive for, an idea that calmed the fear of death and incented most souls to be kind to one another. Of course there were those who didn’t give a flying rat’s ass about kindness and instead derived their joy from of the misery of others, but wasn’t joy still joy no matter the cause?

I had been the source of Mark’s joy for a decade. Every day he shared his joy with me: fists, cigarette burns and belittling comments magically transforming his joy into my pain when transferred from him to me. The very last time he shared his joy with me I damn near died, and as the surge of electricity delivered from the defibrillators surged through my body to pull be back from death I heard someone whisper in my mind: Don’t go. I’m waiting.

That was three years ago. That was a year of physical therapy ago. That was a lifetime ago.

The longest lasting of my scars was my thickly grown reserve. I kept my heart sheltered and my trust locked away, unwilling to share either for fear of reliving the same kind of joy all over again. I had worked hard physically, emotionally and spiritually to ensure I would never again be a victim, but that kind of impenetrable armor made it impossible for anyone to get close to me. It was both lonely and comforting.

Sitting in the corner of my favorite coffee shop I quietly sipped my honey latte as I read the latest Christopher Moore novel, chuckling to myself from time to time at his wry humor. Glancing at the clock on the wall I gathered my things and rose from the worn leather chair I’d occupied, finishing off my coffee before heading toward the door, waving at the familiar staff.

“Hey!” I heard the voice behind me but paid it no mind, it was undoubtedly one of the staff but the next time it spoke a familiar bell went off in my head and made me stop. “Don’t go.”

Pausing by the door I turned and let my brown eyes scan the various seating areas, coming to a stop on the tall man who had gotten to his feet and was walking toward me. I glanced behind me, certain he was calling out to someone else but then he stopped directly in front of me and smiled as he extended his hand.

He seemed strangely familiar as I stared from his hand to his eyes and I could feel the frown on my face, “I think you have me confused with someone else,” I said simply.

He smiled wider, hand still extended, “I’m waiting.”

The bell in my head went off again and I struggled to understand why he seemed so familiar to me. Slowly, reluctantly I reached out and grasped his hand in a firm handshake. The touch of his skin flooded my mind with the voice that had called to me the moment I’d died, his voice, and the comfortable sound turned my armor to insubstantial smoke that disappeared in a puff of tentative trust.

Love Died That Day

It was an endless cycle that she was in and there was no way end it, not even if she truly wanted out. She woke every morning not knowing where she would be or what to expect. She knew she would be many places at once, she always was but she knew herself well enough to know that she would always became more involved in one case each day. Nothing and no one was ever the same after her touch.

From the moment she opened her eyes each day it was like watching a movie. Countless times over the eons she had heard that she was in control when in truth she wasn’t, there wasn’t anything she could do to affect the outcome of any situation; she was simply along for the emotional ride.

Some people were very determined to hold onto her when they really should be letting her go. Others tossed her aside as easily as a stone, having not felt her weight or her value. Grasping, needy, desperate, content, complacent, or toxic; everyone twisted her into what they thought she should be when all they needed to do was take her as she was. Unconditional acceptance and no demands to change were the things that made her rich and precious and fragile.

As her eyes opened with the dawn she saw them. They were standing in the center of a well appointed bedroom, the décor as elegant as the pair themselves. He wore tailored slacks of dove grey, sharply creased down the front and back, into which was tucked an ivory shirt of the finest silk, the Mother of Pearl buttons shining with subtle iridescence in the soft morning light. His dark hair was still damp from his shower and he spoke as he resumed moving around the room in his typical morning routine.

The woman was statuesque. Easily 6 feet tall her slender frame was wrapped in a red silk dress, flattering her figure to the fullest with a silver chain belt accentuating her waist while the sweetheart neckline framed her décolleté with a perfect balance of propriety and temptation. Ivory silk stockings sheathed her impossibly long legs and she slipped into red leather Vera Wang heels as their conversation continued.

Watching the scene unfold before her was like coming into a book only pages from the end, which had always bothered her, if she had gotten there sooner would there have been a different outcome. She would never know. And now she watched this couple dredge up past aggravations, past complaints, past hurt… past past past. Rarely was the death stroke anything current, instead past feelings were wielded like weapons quietly stored away… just in case.

She wanted them to yell at each other, to flail and rant and rave, any show of emotion was better than none. Her most common and painful killer was apathy and laziness. People became complacent, comfortable, and stopped appreciating what attracted them to each other in the first place. She no longer met him at the door in sexy lingerie, seducing him and stirring in him pleasure he’d never known. He no longer brought her flowers or told her how beautiful she was to him even when she looked her worst.

Apathy was deadly to her.

Their argument was nearing its end, after so many millennia she could sense it and she held her breath, waiting. They never shouted, never yelled, they simply agreed that they were done and as the door closed in their wake the click of the steel mechanism sliding into place was like a shotgun blast to the chest. The scene went black as she fell to the floor as she had done a millions times before; Love died that day but would blossom elsewhere from a seed called hope.

Hearts

Pearl stood outside the restaurant waiting for Luke, huddling into her knee length brown coat and lifting the large collar to shield her neck from the frigid wind. Her pale grey eyes scanned the sidewalk, looking for any sign of the long legged swagger that would go a long way to make up for his lateness, but there was no sign of him.

With a frustrated sigh Pearl turned and headed south, walking directly into the wind and having to lower her face against it, her gaze focusing on the intermittent pools of watery yellow lamplight as she passed from one to the next. Her mind started making up all the shit a girl’s mind invents whenever she gets stood up: “What did I do?” “Maybe he’s not that interested.” “Maybe he’s dead in a ditch.”

Pearl chuckled to herself, the logical side of her brain knowing something very last minute had to have come up and the irrational side making up all kinds of crazy stories and she knew that the two sides needed to have a meeting.

It wasn’t uncommon to hear movement and conversation coming from the dark depths of the city’s many alleys, but this sound brought Pearl up short and she stopped, straining her ears to see if she would hear it again. She counted the passing of time by the pounding of her pulse. There it was again. In spite of not being able to make out any words there was something familiar about the voice, and turning toward it she made her way slowly into the shadows.

Her heels clicked quietly on the cracked pavement as she moved from cover to cover, pausing behind a dumpster then behind a stack of dilapidated pallets, each time pausing to listen for the voice. Pearl followed the sound like ET followed bits of candy, one by one she was drawn closer to the source and from where she crouched behind an old barrel she watched as two shadowy figures dragged an apparently less than willing third through a peeling blue door.

Like a hammer striking an anvil her mind pinpointed the strangled voice she’d been following: Luke. Once the figures disappeared from view she stood and jogged toward the building, stopping to stare at the plain white wall; there was no door.

“What the hell?” she asked quietly to no one in particular and she gasped when someone answered.

“You must see through what you see to what you can not.”

Pearl spun and scanned the area, grey eyes straining to see through grey gloom and stared as a faint light approached her. The marble sized green light bobbed and moved as though fighting a draft as it tried to hover at eye level.

“What do you mean?” she asked; she could give more thought to the fact that she was talking to a firefly later.

“She seeks what was lost.” The light said, bouncing more and more as though agitated, “Now! Go now!”

Pearl turned and stared at the wall, her brows drawing together in confusion. “I don’t understand.”

The tiny light zipped off and returned like a kamikaze pilot, dive bombing her head and she ducked and swatted at it. Splitting her focus between the insistent, cryptic helper and the wall Pearl took a few steps back and then ran at the wall, ramming it with her shoulder. She grunted in pain and adrenaline pushed her past it when the wall cracked and blue could be seen last the white.

As she backed up to run at it again the light calmed down and ceased its assaults. After three more painful meetings between her shoulder and the wall Pearl stumbled through the suddenly open door, emerging with an almost audible pop into a large cavernous room and her sudden appearance brought four pairs of eyes to rest on her.

Surprise hung in the air like a partially inflated balloon, bursting when a tall, thin woman let out a shriek and pointed an accusatory finger. As though an order was hidden in that sound a man the size of a linebacker charged her and Pearl dodged to the right just as he dove for her, his wide shoulders clipping her and knocking her to the floor.

Flipping onto her belly Pearl tried to scramble away, reaching for anything to give herself leverage, but he grabbed her leg and pulled her back and clutched her throat, squeezing with his meaty hand. She tried to pry at his fingers but they wouldn’t be moved. Spying the shoes she’d been knocked out of she reached out for one, straining her arm to its limit as her vision started to go grey around the edges.

Her fingers touched the smooth leather of her Jimmy Chu’s and she wrapped her fingers around it, cocking her arm back and then swinging out again. The sudden weight of the man’s body on her was like being pressed under a car and it took all she had to push him aside and wriggle out from under him. Climbing to her feet she looked at the shoe still clutched in her hand, the bloodied heel of her stiletto dripped with thicker things that used to be behind the man’s temple.

“And people say shoes like this are bad for you,” Pearl said, using humor to deflect fear as she stared from where Luke lay strapped to a sinister looking table to the crazy lady.

The woman rushed her, fingers curved like claws and she let out another ear piercing screech. Pearl bolted to left and ran around Luke’s table as the woman snatched up a jar from a shelf and hurled it at her, the glass shattering against the wall and spraying Pearl with formaldehyde.

“They are mine!” she screeched, “Mine to eat! Mine to love!” A jar sailed through the air to punctuate each statement, and with wide eyes Pearl soon realized that the wall behind the crazy lady was lined with shelf upon shelf of hearts, some still beating.

“Oh, fuck this!” Pearl said, lifting the hem of her coat and dress simultaneously and pulling a pistol from the holster strapped around her thigh, leveling it at the woman and firing a single shot that tore its way through her crazed grey matter.

Pearl holstered the gun and stared down into Luke’s wide blue eyes, shrugging one shoulder as she went about freeing him, “Did I mention I’m with the NSA?”

Winter

All he could feel was pain. All kinds of pain. Searing pain that set every nerve on fire. Throbbing pain from shattered bone. Sharp pain from expertly split skin and muscle. His mouth and eyes were filled with blood and grit, his lungs filling slowly with thick red life in an effort to catch up and his breath came in wet gurgles. With a sudden white hot flash the pain blissfully disappeared in the wake of a neck breaking blow to the head.

* * *
Winter sat in the corner of the large tavern, his golden eyes moving from one person to the next, ever aware of who was doing what, where they were doing it and how it might affect him. He didn’t know why he was so hyper-aware of his surroundings, nor was Bothun ever able to explain it during the many months he’d spent recovering from being beaten nearly to death.

Bothun had found him on the brink of death, mostly buried in the snow, the red of his blood having caught the old mage’s eye as it was absorbed into the crystalline drifts piling up around his frostbitten limbs. For months he’d lain unconscious, his body mending with the aid of powerful magic, and even after waking up it was another six months before he was well enough to leave Bothun’s care.

The old man had dubbed him Winter, as much for the season in which he was found as for the chill that settled over those who looked at him. Winter had woken with no memory of who he was, where he was from or what had happened to him, and after almost a year of healing and rehabilitation it was with a grateful handshake he set out to uncover his past.

The orange light from the fire crackling in the large fireplace cast eerie shadows across his face, the darkness disappearing into the black of his hair which hung almost to his waist, the heavy mass confined into a thick braid and bound at the end with a leather band from which hung a silver coin. He’d found the coin in the bag of possessions that Bothun had returned to him once he’d regained some of his strength, along with a rare Prince Jamison revolver and hand tooled leather holster.

The grip was made of ribbon mahogany, the deep red hue striped with black and worn smooth from what he could only assume was his own use of the weapon. The burnished steel of the barrel, frame, cylinder and trigger guard were elaborately decorated with relief flourishes, the dark recesses making the ornate design stand out. Bothun had tried to grip the weapon but painfully learned that it was protected by a dark magic the likes of which he’d never encountered, which explained why Winter’s attackers hadn’t stolen it.

Winter continued to watch as the other patrons cast sideways glances at him, the men wary with hands idly resting on the hilts of their swords and the women excited, tittering and smiling shyly at him. His perfectly sculpted face was that of a God, broad shouldered and tall he simply commanded attention, though it was more the almost electric aura around him that made him impossible to ignore.

Pushing his empty plate away he stood up, towering over the smaller desert people who were native to the area, and their dark eyes turned to watch him as he made his way toward the door. The weight of so many stares was almost measureable and he felt it pressing against his back like a hand, urging him to leave so the air could again be easily breathed. A scent wafted past his nose, sparking an elusive memory in the back of his mind and he spun on his heel, his fierce eyes trying to locate the source.

A lithe figure was pushed forward, her delicate frame stumbling toward him and Winter’s body reacted before his mind fully processed the situation, drawing his revolver and firing a single bullet. Amid the screams and subsequent chaos the woman staggered and he caught her as she fell; he didn’t see who had pushed her and he scowled into the crowd but there were too many fleeing bodies to determine who the culprit had been.

Winter lifted the woman into his arms and carried her to a long table, clearing it of dishes with a single swipe of his arm before laying her down. She stared up at him with wide blue eyes. Blue? The desert people didn’t have blue eyes. He pulled the turban from her head, sending a thick wave of red hair spilling across the arm that cradled her shoulders and he was again assaulted by the familiar scent that had stopped him only moments before.

The tavern was almost empty now, only a handful of slaves huddling in the corners undoubtedly hoping he wouldn’t see them, and the quiet hung like heavy clouds; silent but oppressive. Blood trickled from the corner of her mouth and from her left ear and Winter watched in frustrated confusion as she slowly reached into the folds of her robes and extracted a small pouch. She pushed it into his hand before using the last of her strength to reach up and press her palm to his cheek, giving a weak smile before the light left her eyes.

Winter stared at her face, now empty of life, and carefully extracted his arm from under her. Loosening the drawstring on the pouch he upended it and dumped its contents into his palm, staring wide eyed at the silver coin that was identical to the one ornamenting his hair.

Hannah

Her velvety brown eyes stared at the words scribbled on the single old sheet of stationary, ink splotches spattered across the fragile yellow paper. In spite of having found the letter only hours before, she had read the note a thousand times if she’d read it once, but having it memorized didn’t keep her from reading it again.

She raised her eyes, her gaze moving slowly up the imposing stone façade of the house she stood before, and as she took her first step forward a bolt of lightening suddenly flashed a warning at her from the rapidly gathering clouds. She hesitated for only a heartbeat.

The old boards creaked under her feet as she ascended the stairs and slowly moved across the wide porch toward the large double front doors. Pulling a heavy ring from her purse she selected one of the old iron keys and inserted it into the lock, having to use both hands and a good deal of force to get the mechanisms to move through the built up rust.
With grinding protests the lock gave way and with a trembling hand she turned the knob and pushed, the hinges groaning like weary old men as the door swung inward.

The air was thick with dust. Tiny specks danced through the sunlight that was intermittently blocked out by heavy clouds in an ever changing ocular staccato, flitting in the eddies of air as she moved from room to room. Furniture was draped in sheets that were once white, the passing of time having turned them the same aged yellow as the paper clutched in her hand.

Cobwebs large enough for her to use as hammocks filled corners and doorways, dainty webs laced balusters together and thick mats of silk threads cocooned the chandeliers. Rugs were rolled and stacked like cord wood in each room, the dust so thick on the hardwood floor that she left footprints as she walked, the boards creaking under the forgotten feel of a human’s weight.

She walked through the kitchen, her gaze glancing over the wood burning stove, the pot rack laden with cast iron skillets and the butcher block topped table like a stone skimming across the surface of a still lake. She made a direct line toward the back door, reaching for the ornate knob and letting out a surprised scream when she was pushed from behind, cold hands slamming her against the still closed door.

Spinning and pressing her back to the wall her eyes scanned the room, looking for her assailant even while knowing she wouldn’t find them. Her mind went back to the letter, written over a hundred years before from a despondent husband to his dead wife:

My dearest Hannah,

This morning finds me wracked by the fiery pangs of your absence. Remembering the softness of your skin, the mirth in your eyes and the gentleness of your touch leaves me lost and longing. Nothing and no one will ever fill the vacancy left in my soul. The day I shrug off this mortal coil can come none too soon if the hereafter finds me lying by your side. Wait for me, love.

Forever yours,

Roger

Roger had been her Great Grandfather, and he had died when she was only 10. She fondly remembered sitting on his knee and listening with a young girl’s romantic heart as he spoke of his Hannah, her namesake. Despite the years that had passed, his love for his lost wife was an ever present light in his dimming eyes, and the mere mention of her name seemed to bring out of him the young man he once was.

He had moved out of the house he and Hannah had shared, refusing to create any memories there that didn’t include her, and lived out his life by raising their one young son. As he lay in his bed dying, Hannah’s small hands tucking the quilts her mother had made around his frail body, she wept silently both in anguish and in joy. Anguish that she was losing him and joy that he was going to be with his wife again.

The dreams started only days after he died. Hannah would wake up dripping with sweat, her heart pounding and feeling an overwhelming sense of panic, as though she had lost something and couldn’t find it anywhere. Her parents would soothe her, calm her, rock her, but she couldn’t get anyone to believe that something had gone wrong with Great grandpa’s soul.

These dreams plagued Hannah almost nightly all the way through college, and it was while home for the holidays that she found Roger’s letter to Hannah and the pieces fell into place. She had been awakened by the same sense of panic she had felt for as long as she could remember, getting up and heading outside to get some air, the cool autumn air chilling the sweat on her skin.

Hannah sat curled up in one of the worn rocking chairs on the wide porch, her brown eyes staring unfocused across the front yard until a milky shadow moved near the garden shed. Unfolding herself she stood up and moved toward it, not feeling afraid but rather a sense of excited anticipation came over her. She felt pushed and guided and directed. She pulled the door open and walked directly to a stack of old boxes, her hands moving the unimportant ones aside and, as if controlled by someone else, she reached into the dusty contents of a non-descript shoebox and extracted one specific letter and a ring of old keys.

It only took one reading of the letter for her to understand what she needed to do. She packed a small bag, left a note for her parents and climbed behind the wheel of her mom’s SUV. Four hours later she found herself being attacked by her Great Grandmother.

“Wait!” she shouted, holding her arms up to shield her head from invisible fists. “Grandma, stop! He’s here! I’ve brought him to you!” Hannah’s voice carried through the house, echoing off the high ceiling. The room was suddenly still, holding its breath and watching her with what felt like skepticism. Reaching into the small bag slung over her shoulder, Hannah extracted a polished silver urn, Roger’s name engraved across the front and she held it out as proof.

Slowly she reached for the doorknob again, letting out the breath she hadn’t realized she was holding until she stepped through the doorway without incident. She felt something move past her, like the brush of heavy skirts scented with lavender, and she followed the scent to the family graveyard. A low iron gate hung oddly from one rusted hinge, the sagging corner stuck in the dirt. Two dozen headstones poked up through the thick carpet of weeds, ivy and decomposing leaves, the stone covered in moss and the chiseled words faded.

Hannah moved slowly, still following the scent of lavender, to the far corner of the graveyard, stopping to stare at the bare earth of her Great Grandmother’s grave. Nothing grew there. The air didn’t stir. The temperature dropped. She felt something pacing, circling her like an impatient lion and with slow, deliberate movements she removed the lid from the urn and sprinkled the remains of her Great Grandfather’s body onto the bare dirt at the base of the half finished dual headstone.

It felt like the universe held its breath and for several minutes nothing moved, nothing made a noise. With a sudden burst of air, thick green grass and brilliantly colored wildflowers erupted from the naked ground. The branches of the trees that hung bare over the ground exploded with emerald leaves, birds circled overhead and the dark clouds that had felt so ominous split and showered a warm rain down onto Hannah’s uplifted face.

In the sporadic sunlight that reflected through the fat drops, out of the corner of her eye, Hannah watched her Great Grandparents reunion and in that moment she knew what pure joy looked like.

Montana

Blue skies stretch, covering the whole of the world that at that moment contains only me.

Black mountains reach up, draped in snowy lace, brushing the sky like a lover’s lips.

Wide green plains roll, a velvety ocean grown still, rising and falling like breath.

Trees sway in a silky breeze, leaves preening, waving at those who pause to greet them.

Water flows, running fast or trickling, making music to accompany the bird song.

Stretched out on the velvet swell of ground, my vision draped in blue sky and dancing trees, black mountains embrace me and the land’s wet kisses saturate me where we touch.

The languid pulse of Montana infected me with awe and wonder because I took the time to breathe her in; we won’t be roommates, but rather occasional lovers, madly falling together each time we meet.

See You In The Funny Pages

She stood outside, wearing the storm like armor. The fat, warm raindrops struck her bare shoulders and her upturned face, exploding into a hundred smaller drops that saturated the aqua cotton of her summer dress, molding it to her body: breasts, thighs and hips. Her sandaled feet stood in an ever growing puddle, unaware and uncaring, and the shallow water lapped at her red polished toes.

He had told her about summer storms, the lightening racing across the sky, chased by claps of thunder she could feel in her chest; but the storms were only part of why she had flown in to visit him. The wide sky was black, every single star obscured by the heavy clouds that loomed overhead, lost against the dark of the night. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, then another, and another until she felt the threat of tears had passed.

“Sasha, come back inside.” Adam’s voice was frustrated, but her own frustration was clear in the rigid set of her entire frame, her hands fisted at her sides, and she didn’t reply. She heard him step off the curb and walk up behind her, his pace slow and tentative as though she was a wild animal who might turn and bite him. When he laid his hands gently on her shoulders she had conflicting urges: to turn and fold herself into his embrace, or to step away.

Her internal conflict lasted only a few heartbeats yet it felt like eons, and it took every ounce of will she had to take that single step away from him, his fingers sliding over her skin until they fell away entirely. Folding her arms as a means of perceived protection from the painful conversation she knew was coming she turned slowly to face him, her hazel eyes locking with his light blue ones through the veil of rain.

“Adam,” Sasha began, her voice quiet. He mimicked her pose and folded his arms across his chest as he shook his head.

“I know that look, Sasha,” he said, his own deep voice quiet.

“Then do I even need to say anything?” she asked, hoping he would let her off the hook, but she knew better.

“Yes!” His blue eyes grew fierce and he stepped forward, his long fingers gripping her slick shoulders, “I want to hear you say it. Tell me and let’s see if either of us believes it!”

The pressure of his hold made her anger flare to life and reaching up she fisted her hands into the wet cotton of his T-shirt, glaring up into his face. “You want to hear it? Fine! I’m selfish! I want to kiss you and touch you and make love to you, and I can’t because besides living so far away you’re married!!”

Adam opened his mouth to speak but the adamant shaking of Sasha’s head silenced him. “I know what I’m saying isn’t right, isn’t fair, but I’m in pain and I think its better that we part as friends, I don’t want to lose that.” A small smile lifted one corner of her mouth as she released his shirt, her hands smoothing out the wrinkles. “We’ve known each other a long time,” she said wistfully, “But it’s clear your wife doesn’t like me and I won’t be a secret.” Stepping forward Sasha closed the gap between them, rising onto her tip toes and kissing him softly. “I’ll see you in the funny papers.”

Stepping around him she went back into her hotel, refusing to look back. Her heart was breaking but sometimes you have to run away to see if someone will chase you.

Full Spectrum

Dawn
Milky cool peach
Rising
Violet pink lavender
Breaking
Amber honey topaz
Sailing
Warm golden liquid
Soaring
Caress cover embrace
Cresting
Bask yellow fire
Sinking
Bliss nourish fulfill
Falling
Reach touch hold
Fading
Breathe orange kisses
Failing
Filter cool color
Dusk
Veiled indigo touch

Nothing Is Forbidden, Everything Is Allowed

I’d been pretty apprehensive when my best friend Sasha had invited me to her favorite club. I was well aware that Sasha was far wilder than I was, as far as I knew there wasn’t anything she wouldn’t try at least once and that held true in every facet of her life. The particular facet she had coaxed me into sharing with her; however, was propelling me into uncharted territory and I couldn’t calm the butterflies in my stomach.

It wasn’t that I was sexually repressed or inexperienced, I simply hadn’t ventured too far outside the boundaries set by society at large. And now here I was, dressed in a dress chosen by Sasha and following her into the dark interior of the club.

The feel of the place wasn’t what I had expected. Basing my expectations on the few strip clubs I’d been in I found the dim lighting unsurprising, but that’s where the similarities ended. There was no stage, no visible DJ spinning loud bass heavy songs for the girls to dance to, and the air didn’t smell of unwashed bodies.

Small groupings of soft chairs and love seats surrounded low tables and filled the enormous room, lit warmly by candlelight that illuminated so many faces. Soothing music of the vocal jazz variety flowed from invisible speakers, filling the air like mist and I could almost feel it beading up on my eyelashes.

Sasha took me by the hand and led me to the far back corner of the club, motioning for me to sit as she settled herself into the burgundy chair across from me. The blueberry velvet of my own chair felt especially soft under my fingertips and I couldn’t resist petting it idly.

Our server appeared and I had to do a double take, again surprised by the unexpected. The scantily clad woman I’d anticipated was nothing at all like the tall, handsome man who smiled down at me after giving Sasha a kiss on the cheek, a gesture that looked to me like he’d done it before. How often did Sasha come here I wondered.

I barely noticed when Sasha ordered champagne for us, simply staring like a fool as the server walked away with a wink in my direction. “What is this place?” I asked Sasha, keeping my voice low. Her bark of laughter was in no way muted and I tried to shush her, to no avail.

“Oh my darling Jess,” she replied with a wide smile, patting my knee, “You have no idea the treats you are in for tonight.”

Finding myself both intrigued and alarmed by that statement I sat back and watched. I watched people talking quietly over drinks or h'ordeuvres. I watched as pairs and groups wandered off together and disappeared behind a heavy black curtain I hadn’t noticed before, and I couldn’t help but wonder what was back there.

When our server returned he popped the champagne and poured two glasses, holding one out to me while sinking down into the chair beside me with the other. I passed a confused look to Sasha who rose to her feet as our server sat, as though choreographed, and all I got from her was an encouraging wink as she walked away.

The clinking of his glass against mine brought my gaze back to his face and he beamed a brilliant smile at me. “What shall we drink to?” he asked. His voice was like mink; soft, silky and it should have been totally illegal.

“I’m sorry, this is my first time here and I’m not sure what the protocol is.” I replied honestly, feeling very out of my depth. “I mean, is this allowed?” I punctuated my question by gesturing at him sitting there with his glass of wine.

He laughed, rich and thick like chocolate that clings to your tongue, his blue eyes sparkling in the candlelight. “My dear, in this place nothing is forbidden, everything is permitted.”

As we raised our glasses to drink to that I knew this would be a night I would never forget.