Your Vote Urgently Required - It's the Anthology Thread of the 2011/2012 SDMB Short Fiction Contest

[Le_Ministre_de_l_au-dela]

Hello, everyone, and welcome to the Anthology Thread of the SDMB Short Fiction Contest, late 2011/early 2012 edition. The poll will appear in about 23 hours.

A quick recap of the rules -

At 9 AM EST, Tuesday, December 20th, 2011, I posted a link to a photo (found by random means) and also three words (again, obtained by random means) in an auto-reply message at sdmbpoetrysweatshop at gmail dot com. Writers still have until 10 PM EST, Sunday, January 8th, 2012 to write an original piece of short fiction, no more than 2,000 words in length, based in some way on that photo and those three words. All interested participants will be working from the same compulsory material.

As of the posting of this thread, there will still be ~23 hours left to any interested participants.

Writers - send your completed work to me, preferably in a .doc format, at sdmbpoetrysweatshop at gmail dot com before 10 PM EST, Sunday, January 8th, 2012. I will verify that it is 2,000 words or less, and I will post it in this Anthology Thread. Please include your SDMB username, and please let me know if your story incorporates any special text such as bold, italic or underline. (These codes do not always transfer directly, and I do want your stories to look right.) I will post the stories as a ~100 word teaser, followed by the rest of the story in a spoiler box, (Click the button labeled ‘spoiler’ to reveal the text, for those not familiar with the SDMB.) with the authors’ names in separate spoiler boxes.

At 10 PM EST, Sunday, January 8th, 2012, a multiple choice poll will be established to determine the readers’ favourite story. I would also ask voters to choose those stories that have incorporated the compulsory material in the most interesting manner. At the end of a week, the poll will close and we will declare a winner of the PoeHenryParkerSaki award.

The poll, once established, will be a secret ballot type poll. No one need ever know how you voted. I would, however, encourage everyone to please vote. You are providing an important source of feedback to the writers.

While we welcome readers’ comments, may I please request that readers hold off until after the poll is established. That way, the first posts in the thread will all be the various stories. After the poll is established, your comments are enthusiastically encouraged.

The compulsory material is -

The Photograph

and the following three words -

Invert
Drag
Corporate

And now, here are the stories that this contest has produced. I want to point out - the authors’ user names are in spoiler boxes at the end of the stories. Please do not be fooled by the fact that they appear in ‘replies’ sent by me - only one of these stories is mine.

Enjoy!

Le Ministre de l’au-delà

[Le_Ministre_de_l_au-dela]

“Come in and sit down, Matthew. We need to talk about something.” This was hardly the “welcome home” I expected from my father as I stepped through the front door with a bag of dirty laundry over my shoulder. I’d just driven four hours from my college dorm to spend Christmas break at home.

“What’s up?” I asked. I dropped the laundry and plopped down on the couch. I noticed Mom sitting on the love seat on the opposite side of the room, her eyes puffy and red, and her hands clutching a tissue to her chest. The TV was off, so this was serious. I didn’t think the university would call my parents about one underage drinking violation on campus. I planned to tell them anyway, but this seemed a bit of an overreaction on Mom’s part.

[spoiler]“Matthew,” Dad started, “we have some bad news about Grandpa Wilkins. He was in a car accident at 9:00 AM this morning and was taken by ambulance to St. Bartholomew’s Memorial Hospital. He did not survive the trip, Matthew. He’s gone.” At the word “gone” my mother let out a faint squeak and my heart dropped into my stomach. My eyes welled up and I couldn’t catch my breath for a couple minutes.

The rest of that day was a bit of a haze. Everything moved in slow motion throughout the entire Christmas break. Grandpa’s funeral was the morning of Christmas Eve. My mother’s side of the family was huge. She had four brothers and three sisters and all of them had at least three children. Half of this small town consisted of my cousins and second-cousins and third-cousins. People jokingly called it “Wilkinsville.” The entire population paid their respects that day.

The reading of his will was the day after Christmas. Nearly everyone who was at the funeral was crammed into the corporate conference room at the Holiday Inn. Some of them appeared to be licking their chops, hoping for a big payday. Some of them got their wish. Grandpa was wealthy, that was no secret. He owned and operated the town’s only pharmacy for almost forty years before handing it down to my uncle Ted.

I had a pretty close relationship with Grandpa Wilkins. My parents never told me, but I think he was on his way to our house to welcome me home when he had his accident. Grandpa had taken me to my first NFL game and showed me around the Field Museum in Chicago. When I was 13 we took a road trip, just the two of us, all the way to Canton, Ohio to tour the Professional Football Hall of Fame. My cousins were jealous, but they masked it by telling me that Grandpa just felt bad for me because my parents weren’t as well-off as my aunts and uncles. My Grandma died of brain cancer when I was only two, so I never really knew her.

Most of the estate was left to Grandpa’s immediate children. Their children, my cousins, all got a thousand dollars that, the will specified, was meant to be used “for anything other than education. Have some fun!” I got the thousand dollars, as well, plus one more thing. Grandpa’s pocket watch.

Grandpa’s pocket watch never left his pocket. Everyone knew he had it, but nobody ever thought much of it. He never looked at it to tell the time and he never let anyone touch it. I asked him once if I could see it and he replied, “not quite yet.” I didn’t know what that meant at the time.

That night I sat awake at the foot of my bed with the watch in my hands. It did not work. It certainly was nothing special. It had a chain at the top, a bell shape with tassels on the bottom and Roman numerals on the face. I opened the back of it, just looking at the mechanics. I had no idea what it was supposed to look like in there, so I didn’t bother trying to fix it. I put it in my sock drawer and planned on never thinking much about it again.

The next day, just after noon, my dad came to my room and said there was someone at the door for me. I went downstairs and saw an old man standing just inside the door with a fine hat in his hands.

“You must be Matthew,” he said as he extended his right hand for a shake. He had a gruff voice accompanied by a pretty cool British accent.

“Yes, sir,” I replied as I shook his hand.

“My name is Arthur Chesterfield and I was a friend of your grandfather’s. I saw you at the funeral the other day. Your grandfather told me a lot about you. I wonder if you might join me for lunch as I have something to share with you.” This was too intriguing.

We sat in the corner booth at a local diner, Mr. Chesterfield with a tea and I with a Pepsi.

“So, are you from England?” I asked.

“Quite right, Matthew,” was his reply. I could probably listen to this guy talk all day.

“I knew your grandfather when he studied at Cambridge.”

“Ok,” I said. Everyone knew that Grandpa spend a brief time in England when he was in college. I think he was only there for one semester.

“We roomed together, actually,” he said. “Matthew, I will get straight to the heart of the matter. Your grandfather took something of mine before he returned to the States and I’d like to have it back. I understand you are in possession of a pocket watch, are you not?”

“I am,” I said. “But it doesn’t work. He left it to me in his will.”

“Yes, Matthew, and he should not have. It belonged to me. I don’t want to say that he stole it necessarily, but rather he conned me out of it. He made a bet with me that was an unfair wager.”

“What was it?” I asked.

“It is of no concern now,” he replied.

“Well, sir, I only have your word that it was an unfair wager. Obviously, my grandfather did not feel that way or else he would not have kept the watch and given it to me.”

“Quite right, young man, you do only have my word and it will have to do. I would like the watch returned to me when we arrive back at your house,” he said.

“Sorry, sir, but I’d like to respect my grandfather’s wishes and hold on to the watch.” Arthur Chesterfield lowered his bushy, white eyebrows and scowled at me. He drank his tea in silence.

“Boy,” he said in his rental car as he pulled up my driveway, “you best think on this some more. You’re doing what you think is right, I’m sure. But please keep me in mind if you reconsider.” With that, he extended a business card with his contact information. “I’m at the Holiday Inn tonight and traveling back tomorrow, with or without the watch. “ I exited the car. “And boy,” I don’t know why he called me boy now, “if you decide you can’t give the watch to me, for God’s sake, throw it in a lake. Good day.” He drove onto the road and out of sight.

I walked straight up the stairs to my room, opened my sock drawer and examined the watch again. What the hell was so special about this old pocket watch? I took it downstairs and found my mother sitting alone at the kitchen table with a coffee.

“Mom,” I said.

“Yes, honey,” she replied without lifting her eyes from the candle centerpiece on the table. I sat across from her.

“What do you know about this watch?” I laid it on the table in front of me. She looked at it. She smiled. Dad came in from outside and sat at the table with us.

“Dad, er, Grandpa, got it in England. I think he won it in a bet with someone over there.”

“Yes, Arthur Chesterfield,” I said.

“That is the man, yes,” she said. “Grandpa never liked him. Said he was a pompous asshole. Didn’t deserve this watch.”

“That’s the British for you,” said Dad.

“What’s so special about the watch?” I asked.

“I don’t know, Matthew,” said Mom. “My brothers and sisters and I were never allowed to touch it. Frankly, I’d forgotten about it until it was mentioned in the will.”

“Well, Arthur Chesterfield wants it back. I don’t know why Grandpa had to drag me into whatever feud he’s got with that guy,” I said. “Chesterfield claims that Grandpa basically stole the watch from him.”

“That’s not true,” said Mom. “I know that’s not true. There is more to the story. Mom, your grandmother, told me, completely out of the blue, shortly before she died, that Grandpa won that watch by betting on something quite macabre. A classmate of Grandpa’s and Mr. Chesterfield’s had been a terrible bar fight and Grandpa bet that the student would die from his wounds the very evening he made the wager. Sure enough, the young man died and Grandpa took the watch.”

“What if he had lost that bet?” Dad asked. I wondered this myself.

“I don’t know,” said Mom. “I’m sure there was a substantial amount of money involved.”

“Weird,” I said.

“Mother also told me,” continued Mom, “that the watch would probably stop working after she died. I thought it was nonsense. Your grandmother was really losing it towards the end. She was in constant pain and telling wild stories. I guess she thought she was somehow tied to that pocket watch.”

“Yes,” said Dad. “The cancer had completely taken her wits.”

I went upstairs and sat on the foot of my bed again, the watch in my hand. I took the back off again. Looked at the internal parts, inverted the thing and checked it out at different angles. I didn’t know what I was looking for, but nothing seemed out of the ordinary.

“I don’t know your story,” I said to no one in particular, looking at the watch, “but I wager Arthur Chesterfield will hang before he gets his hands on you.” Suddenly, the hands of the watch turned with a rather slow “tick, tick, tick” sound until they stopped at exactly the correct time. I looked at it in amazement.
It appeared to be broken again.

My jaw dropped open and I nearly passed out when I saw the headline of the newspaper the next morning. ENGLISH TOURIST HANGS SELF IN HOTEL ROOM[/spoiler]

Barkis is Willin’

[Le_Ministre_de_l_au-dela]

I think my problems all started with the watch, or at least that’s when I first noticed them. Things are only getting worse. Maybe if I hadn’t mentioned that damned pocket watch to my father things would go back to normal, my memory would straighten out. As it is I have no idea of what’s happening to me. Maybe I’m going crazy. But as it is nobody else seems to notice that anything is different, or changed, I’m writing now so that if the men in the white coats( or the black helicopters) do come and drag me off, someone else will read this and start looking for signs.

See, my dad had a silver pocket watch. It came from my grandfather. I never knew the man because he died when my father was a boy of seven. But dad says one of his clear memories of his own father was his taking the watch from his pocket, looking at the time, and checking the arrival time of trains pulling into the train station. The watch was packed away in a keepsake drawer, and did not run.

[spoiler]So, for Father’s Day I thought it would be cool to take it to a local jeweler, have it cleaned and fixed if needed, and have it put in running order. Except when I asked Dad where he keeps the watch he seemed puzzled, and said he didn’t have a pocket watch from his father, but a silver wristwatch from his mother. It was his brother, my uncle, who got the one I was thinking of. But I distinctly remember my father showing me a pocket watch, with a reflective glass cover. If you held it just right you could see images mirrored in the glass cover, in an inverted position.

Hoookay, I backed off and laughed away the “mistake”. What I recalled seemed so real! But hey, we all have memory lapses, right?

The next “memory blip” was at a trivia contest. One category was “U.S. Presidents” Teams had to label ten pictures with the correct name. Sounds easy, no? But the most recent picture was a total blank to me, a guy with a slightly heavy face, pale complexion, younger looking but with silver gray hair. Fortunately another team member was writing in names so I didn’t have to admit my ignorance because it was damned embarrassing. However, when I saw him write in Bill Clinton I almost lost it. I mean, wasn’t he the First Gentleman, and his wife, Hillary Rodham, our first female President?

More and more I started noticing what I’m calling “differences” to myself. Like the time I sent an email to headquarters of a major fast food chain, about some poor service(I won’t give names, but it’s logo is a set of triple silver arches). When I got a reply it was an automated one letting me know, in polite corporate speak, that they didn’t have a restaurant at that address, and perhaps I’d visited one of their competitors?

Or when I went to the zoo and the name was Mulvane Zoo, and not Gage. Sure, Mulvane is also a name that is locally important and historic, but some of the best times I had as a little kid were at Gage Park, not Mulvane.
One more. I saw the movie “Titanic” and thought it was really stupid. Why didn’t they make it a fictional ship, and not mess with the actual history? Doesn’t everyone know that Titanic made that first voyage to New York safely? It was on the return voyage that it sank! I mean, dramatic license should only be taken so far. It was grousing about this that got me some strange looks and so I shut up.

I read science fiction, and am familiar with the concept of “alternate history” But if I’d somehow slipped into an alternate world, wouldn’t I know it? Maybe run into my double?

Last week I drove by the hot dog place again, the one I’d sent the email about. Only now it was a burger joint with, oh shoot, why go on? I’m getting tired of this and really scared.

I’ve made a decision. My parents are out of town for a week so each day I drive by, feed the cat(only it used to be a dog), bring in the paper and the mail. On top of the piano are all the framed family photos(since when did I have a brother?)

It scared me to do it but I searched the keepsake drawer, and there I have found it, the silver pocket watch. Not a wristwatch, but a pocket watch. I’m going to smash it and see what happens. Maybe my life or memories will at least straighten out, and stop changing. Nothing can be worse than uncertainty, can it?[/spoiler]

Baker

[Le_Ministre_de_l_au-dela]

Mike was a genius.

Actually, the term for people like Mike was “unmeasurable genius” as his IQ tests were consistently over 200 throughout childhood and up through his college days where he got a PhD, on a full academic scholarship, from Harvard. He was 18 years old at the time.

So, you might reasonably question why Mike, at age 21, was currently working at the front desk of a large corporate building in Manhattan, wearing a ridiculous silver and gold security jacket that made him look like an MC at a drag show. To make matters worse, it was a temp job that paid minimum wage.

[spoiler]Well, much to the dismay of Mike’s mother, and the wrath of his father, Mike did not get a PhD in Economics or Business or Medicine or Physics – even though those departments begged him to study there. Nope. Mike got his PhD from the Harvard Center for Middle Eastern Studies in 12th Century Middle Eastern Poetry.

To say his job marketability was limited would be a gross understatement. One employment counselor read his resume and burst into laughing so hard, she actually peed her pants. She was, however, the one who eventually took pity on Mike and gave him this stellar temp job.

Thankfully it was Mike’s lunch break. Although he needed to drop a few pounds, he decided to go out front of the building and grab a hot dog from the vendor cart. Well, three hot dogs to be exact. He was hungry. Mike wasted no time and had probably half a hot dog stuffed in his mouth when suddenly, he heard one man say to another, “zamin-i qulba(na-šuda-ra mi-ngar-um”.

Holy crap! These guys were speaking Hazaragi! For those of us who are not geniuses, Hazaragi is spoken by Hazara people who mainly live in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iran. It was one of the 12 (obscure and mostly useless) languages Mike had learned in his studies. Few people spoke it, and Mike had never heard anyone speak it in the city. If it weren’t for the fact his mouth was crammed full of a huge Kosher hot dog, Mike would have said hello. Instead, he just listened; that sentence he had just heard was weird. The guy had said, “I am looking at an unplowed field.” It was certainly an odd statement to make in front of a 92 story building in the middle of Manhattan. The men continued to speak openly, feeling safe in the assumption that the chubby American wearing clothing from the ex- Shah’s wife, would most certainly not understand.

Mike continued to listen in and felt the blood drain from his body. These two guys were talking about an explosion! They were talking about today! Mike started to choke and grabbed his Diet Coke and took a swig as the two men walked away, disgusted by the sound of the fat American eating.

In seconds, they had disappeared around the corner and Mike was finally able to swallow. Mike ran back into the building and resumed his post behind the front desk. What the fuck should he do now?! Mike reached for the phone to dial 911. What could he say? Two guys were talking on the street? There might be some plot? They were speaking Hazaragi? No, Mike didn’t know when or where or how. Description? Uh, average height and build, dark skin, short hair. Hmm. Mike started to think how this would invert in any interrogation. Chances were quite good that it would be Mike who would be in lock up for 24 hours to see if he were sane.

Mike re-thought the conversation. Maybe he was making too much of it. They mentioned an “unplowed field” – a reference to fertile land and often alluded to when talking about afterlife. They specifically said the explosion would be heard around the world – although that word could mean explosion or surprise. And there was the reference to time and today – something about time movement? Moving in time? The time to move! Yes – they said today was the time they were told to move. Move – no, not move – time to move forward!

Maybe Mike was reading too much into this. They could be planning a surprise picnic in Central Park for their niece. Doubtful. They didn’t look like picnickers.

Agonizing moments lead to an agonizing half hour. Now if he called, he would have to explain waiting to make the call for half an hour.
In the meantime, Mike was handling his desk work – telling people which floor to go to for this business or the next. They had hundreds of offices in the building – everything from software design companies to corporate headquarters for several foreign corporations. Bike messengers would show up, people with appointments, delivery carry-outs from local restaurants. Mike saw that the UPS truck pulled up out front and, as usual, parked illegally. The driver was pulling down another huge cart of packages to take to the back mail room.

Mike answered a phone call and glanced up to see the UPS guy come in with the cart stacked high and noticed it was one of the two men who had spoken outside earlier! Mike quickly noted that the uniform didn’t seem to fit him – it was a bit too large and looked like it was the first time ever worn – you could still see the creases in the shirt from where it had been recently been folded as new; never worn before. Plus, despite the name tag, there was no way in hell this guy’s name was “Chuck”.

The packages were also “off” – they all looked the same, but were held together by twine – who does that these days? Twine on one package, maybe, but all of them? The UPS guy moved really slowly. Mike saw it all come together. This was it! What better way to move a huge bomb into a building than in broad daylight, in the guise of UPS packages. People were walking by and the guy was invisible. Who ever noticed a UPS delivery man?

Mike had to make a decision. It was now or never. Did he trust his gut feeling?

Mike reached down to where he was told never to reach. Mike felt his body shake as he hit the button he was told never to touch. The alarms were loud and furious and lights were blinking everywhere and a tape recording started to play that demanded everyone leave the building immediately! For a minute, people stood in shock and then a few started quickly for the door and then more started running and soon there was mass panic as those on the main floors headed out the doors.

“What the fuck!!” were the first words out of his manager’s mouth as he darted from the back of the first floor and came running to Mike. It was too late. The only people who could stop this now were the police and fire department who were already on their way the minute Mike had pressed the button – the panic button – to be used only in times of great crisis.

Mike noticed the UPS guy was visibly shaken and he dashed off to his truck. Mike pushed his manager aside and ran outside and, as the first police car showed up, Mike screamed, “Stop them!”

It was chaos. Thousands of people were fleeing the building, police cars were pulling up in droves and Mike could hear the fire engines coming closer. Mike ran back into the building and stood next to the huge stack of parcels on the cart and told everyone to stay away from it. Mike’s clown outfit was now drenched with sweat from the panic, the running, the fear, and the chaos swarming about him – all caused by him hitting that button on a hunch.

If ever a genius was hoping to be doing the smart thing, it was Mike right now.

The next day, newspapers around the world were reporting the foiled attempt by a terrorist group to blow up one of the largest buildings in downtown Manhattan. Explosives were found that could have leveled a full city block. Mike was being heralded as a hero. He was honored at the White House, interviewed by most broadcast news anchors and was given a substantial advance on a book that was already pre-sold for movie rights.

But of all the accolades and awards and honors Mike received, his most priceless honor was a simple watch – a family heirloom – given to him by his father and mother. It was a token of their acceptance, a validation of their love and, to Mike’s inner delight, it was silver and gold – a reminder of that godawful uniform he would never have to wear again.[/spoiler]

DMark

[Le_Ministre_de_l_au-dela]

Gokhan was among the very first within the walls of Frontier West. The tall wooden palisades promised him security and a night off watch patrol. The wispy smoke that wafted over the pointed tops of the walls carried with it the rare, sweet smell of a hot meal. After months on the march this place was an oasis on the outskirts of the world.

He and his men were to provide notice to the operators of the fort, the Wild Frontier Trading Corporation, in advance of the army’s arrival. They would set camp here until the movements of the enemy were ascertained. And before the place was overrun with rowdy, drunken soldiers, Gokhan wanted a chance to browse the famous bazaars while the good things were still available at normal prices.

[spoiler]Frontier West was a trading outpost on the very outskirts of occupied territory. They served as a waypoint for several foreign trade routes, and so they had the finest items. The most bizarre. The best mementos. And Gokhan hadn’t a place to spend his pay for two months.

Gokhan wandered the maze of tents and tables and booths that made up the bazaar. He kept moving, slowly, but steadily, always keeping his eyes on the merchandise and trying his best to discourage the exuberant, pushy merchants. Why burn all his money now and risk not having enough for something really exciting near the end?

“Good sir!” A merchant called. Gokhan hardly heard him. “I can offer you something not another person in Frontier West can. How about the ability to cheat death?”

No soldier could resist that pitch. Gokhan strode to the merchant’s table. Upon it piles of insignificant junk were scattered haphazardly. This had better be good.

“What could do such a thing?” Gokhan asked.

“A genuine timepiece of Esseden.” The merchant said. Gokhan had passed several other men hawking trinkets they promised were made by the famed, and probably mythical, Enchanters of Esseden. Gokhan turned to walk away.

“No, look! You can see for yourself.” The man held out a small bronze clock medallion that hung from a simple iron chain. Under a glass dome the hands were frozen atop a plain ivory face etched with the hours of the day. A single blue jewel adorned the top of the medallion. Well crafted, but unremarkable, except that it glowed faintly copper. It pulsed like a heartbeat. This was the real thing.

“What does it do?” Gokhan tried to pulled the medallion for a closer look but the merchant held the chain firm.

“Push the jewel and it will invert time. You can relive the last minute. Dodge that once fatal blow.”

“If this is genuine, why would you sell such a treasure?”

“It has but one charge left. For fifty gold coins you’ll get one chance to undo your demise.”

Fifty gold coins! A hefty sum, a month’s pay for a scout.

Gokhan grabbed a small purse from within his cloak and dropped it on the table. The merchant let go of the chain.

“One chance. Choose wisely.” He said as Gokhan walked away.

Gokhan checked his cards. He held pairs of knights and swords, and a trout. A decent hand, and a playable one. Gokhan played first. He tossed a silver coin from his stack onto the center of the table. The trout followed shortly, face down. Gokhan’s commander, Aric, dealt him a replacement card.

Another trout. Of course.

To Gokhan’s left, another scout in his troop played in the same manner. An infantryman from the regulars played next. Aric was the last player at the table. He played his silver and discarded three, then drew three replacements.

Gokhan put a single gold coin in the center. Just enough to make him give up on the round were the situation reversed. Let’s see who has something.

The scout and the infantryman gave up in turn, leaving just his commander. Gokhan hoped he played to sweeten the pot.

Aric pushed in his whole stack. Fifty one gold coins by Gokhan’s quick count. A whole month’s pay, the last of his remaining money. After drawing three, he likely started with only a single pair at best. Did he get the third?

Gokhan put his hand on his pile. He pushed, but the coins wouldn’t budge. It was if they were bolted to the table. He pushed again, harder. His pile spilled to the center of the table. Gokhan’s hand lingered.

“You’re all in? I’m surprised, it’s unlike you.” Aric said. “Show yourself.”

Gokhan put his cards on the table face up. It’s a good hand. It’s good enough.

Aric nodded, his face cast in grim shadow. He showed three crowns. He won.

Gokhan’s hand went to his chest and clasped the medallion under his shirt. All he need do was push the jewel and he’d have this hand back. He could fold and still have his pay for the next month. Get that new quiver he saw at one of the stands. Or a new pair of boots. Gods, he could use new boots.

Aric scooped up the coins and began dumping them into his purse. The others pushed themselves from the table and vanished into the surrounding camp. The seconds ticked by in Gokhan’s mind. But he didn’t press the jewel.

It’s just a month’s pay. We’ll break camp in a day or two and be back on the march and before I know it I’ll have another month’s pay. A quiver and boots were nothing compared to saving the chance to undo an even more costly mistake.

“Good hand, sir.” Gokhan said. The words sounded meek in his own ears.

Gokhan notched an arrow to his bowstring and dragged it back to his ear, pulling the bow taut. He stared at his target–a large elk, partially hidden behind a dense bush and a thick tree trunk. He needed a better angle on the shot. He couldn’t risk a poorly aimed arrow that wasn’t a guaranteed kill. This late in the season a man could die from tracking a wounded animal over miles until it finally died, and Gokhan wasn’t prepared for such a hunt.

He and the rest of his scout unit had been sent out to gather game to feed the army. The weather had worsened. They would be camped at Frontier West for some time and supplies had dwindled. Incoming merchants and news had slowed to a trickle. As was common in a Fort run by greedy merchants, prices for supplies soared.

Gokhan crept around the tree trunk, carefully, not daring even a breath that would spook his mark. He took care not to brush against a branch, or snap any dried twigs–second nature to a seasoned scout but not a risk he’d leave to chance.

A bird took to the skies somewhere above. The elk looked up reflexively. Gokhan’s heart fell to his feet. It saw him. The elk darted away in panic.

He sprung to race after it but knew he had no chance to catch it. Now, any shot would suffice. He tracked the animal’s path and aimed his arrow just ahead, leading he elk into his shot. Gokhan released.

The arrow zipped past, just behind its mark.

It struck a shadow just beyond. Too short for a tree. It fell over. Gokhan knew he had hit someone. His hand found the medallion as he ran to the body.

It was Aric. He was already dead, the arrow had buried into his abdomen. Blood had spilled everywhere. Aric had released his bowels in death and the stink was overpowering, nauseating. Gokhan almost ran.

He could turn it back. Hit the jewel and it would be undone–the shot, the miss, the death. All of it. But all Gokhan could do was imagine the situation in reverse. What if he had been hit? Here, at his feet, was a reminder of just how precious this power was.

And this was just an accident. Surely everyone would see that. No one would fault him. Why waste it now? These things happen.

A hand reached out from the ground and grabbed at Gokhan’s foot. Or a root, he couldn’t tell. He stumbled into a tree shoulder first and spun himself to the ground. His shoulder popped and the pain drilled through his body instantly. He tried to get to his feet. He fell again. Get up. Run.

Things had gone badly for him. Nobody believed Aric was an accident. An infantryman Gokhan couldn’t even remember had claimed Gokhan had lost all his pay to Aric and that’s why Gokhan had killed him. Another scout in Gokhan’s unit corroborated.

Gokhan thought it was a misunderstanding. He could explain it. But they came after him and he had to put another soldier down with his bow. There was no turning back then, no one would listen. So he ran.

He couldn’t hear anyone in pursuit, but Gokhan couldn’t risk complacency. They would come for him. They would never stop coming. He got up. Gokhan could lose them in the forests, but there was no time for erasing tracks. He had to get away.

He ran down the bank of a stream. The stream had receded with the winter, most of it was ice. He ran across heedlessly. One step broke into the icy water below and Gokhan tripped. His boot came off in the water. He heard cracking but managed to scramble and crawl his way to the other bank.

A town was near. He’d need to barter for another boot, if he didn’t get frostbite first. There was no time to wait, or rest, or think. Gokhan got up and limped the rest of the way.

It was a very small town. A village. Most of the buildings were crude, single-roomed wooden shacks. There was one road that ran through the town, towards Frontier West in one direction and Castle Braggfort in the other. The army had passed through a week ago. There were no supplies here, the army devoured all.

But there was an inn. It was the only sturdy building of the bunch, two floors, with a stone base wall. Gokhan staggered inside.

It was warmer than outside. And dry. The fire in the main hearth burned low and the bar was empty. The innkeeper swept under one of the tables.

“Got a room?” Gokhan asked.

“Ten silvers a night.” The innkeeper looked pessimistic. Gokhan was sure he was a sight to see–wet and muddy with a limp arm and one shoe.

“I don’t have coin.”

“What do you have?”

“My bow.” It was all he had, it would have to do. “It’s finely crafted, well worth the price and then some. You can have it for a room and a meal. And some boots.”

The innkeeper looked at the bow strapped over Gokhan’s shoulder. “I don’t got any spare boots. One night and a meal is fair.”

Gokhan handed the bow over. He hated to part with it. He felt naked and vulnerable, but without boots it wouldn’t matter. He may as well make his final night a warm one. Surely they’d have him by morning.

Gokhan took to his room and laid himself upon the wool mattress. Luxurious, considering the town. He opened his shirt and removed the medallion. It still glowed faintly with that one final miracle.

He thumbed the jewel. He imagined the close calls he’d save himself from with it. A misstep off a cliff. An axe to the back in battle. Getting spotted scouting the enemy. You never could know when you’d need a second chance.[/spoiler]

Jules Andre

[Le_Ministre_de_l_au-dela]

Seth tried not to watch the clock as the end of his last workday for the week was approaching. The minutes seemed to drag. He’d handed along most of his workload to his assistant. Isn’t that what assistants were for, passing along all the mundane work that didn’t require much skill? With nothing else to do himself, he took some time to think about home.

He’d received a phone call hours earlier from Edna, an old family friend, saying that he should return home as soon as possible. She didn’t specify, just said it was “urgent” and involved his parents. More than likely, they had a bad yield and needed money to help them through the coming winter. It wouldn’t have been the first time that had happened in the last ten years.

[spoiler]He didn’t miss the exaggeration that often came with living in a rural town like Windmoore. Not too much tends to happen in a town where people were outnumbered by livestock five to one. The biggest scandal in all the time he’d lived there was when that Miller boy took five dollars from the church collection plate to buy himself an ice-cream. What choice did people have but to make everything seem like front page news?

At five, he headed to his apartment to change and pack for the weekend before hitting the road. Windmoore was a two hour drive from the city, and it would be another 30 minutes to his parent’s house after that. He decided to stop at a diner in the next town over to grab a bite to eat before driving the rest of the way. As handy as his mom was in the field, her skills in the kitchen left much to be desired. Besides, he wasn’t exactly in a hurry to hear how much money he was going to have to part with this time.

He pulled up to his childhood home at almost ten, and was surprised to find Edna and her husband, Burt, sitting on the front porch swing. They stood as he got out of his car, and closed the door. They looked distraught. Edna was shaking with her sobs. Burt’s eyes were red, and though he wasn’t still crying, Seth could see the clean streaks through the dirt on his face.

“I’m so sorry, son.” said Burt “Your parents were killed last night.”

“Oh.”

=====

Seth declined to make a eulogy at his parents funeral. He didn’t really know them the way their friends did. The only times he’d seen them in over ten years was when they were asking for money. He didn’t think, “My parents were very needy people…” was the best way to start a speech at a funeral. Mostly, he thought spending an entire day talking about the past was a waste of his time.

He sat in front while the preacher memorialized his parents, and the church choir sang of losing body but not spirit. He listened as family and friends remembered the happy times and told of how they would be missed. As the day progressed, he could feel the quiver around him as people wept for the loss of his parents. All the while, inside, he felt nothing.

He couldn’t stop thinking that it was Thursday and he should be picking up his dry-cleaning. Tomorrow was lasagna night at De Luca’s. He’d probably miss that too. His left foot was falling asleep. Why was it always the left? He’d have to ask the doctor about that next time he went in. There was a tap on his shoulder.

“I’m so sorry for your loss.” The battery of condolences began as the service ended.

Edna and Burt, who were sitting beside him during the ceremony, were the last to offer their sympathies. “This must be awful hard for you to wrap yourself around. Why don’t you come home with us tonight? I can’t imagine you want to be alone.”

He really wanted to turn them down. He knew how it would go. Burt would want to talk and reminisce all night. That was his way. But, as it was, he was staying in the only Motel in town and it was very run-down. He really wouldn’t mind a hot meal and comfortable mattress for the night. So, “That would be nice.”

=====

Edna had prepared quite a spread. It looked a little like Christmas dinner. The biggest difference was the large piece of steak she dropped on his plate. Edna knew how to make a steak. It was the perfect medium well. Not like his mother’s that always seemed to taste like really fat beef jerky.

Edna had inverted the proper placement of knife and spoon. He thought to say something to her, but when he looked up, she was still sobbing. Her face was swollen with tears. Edna was clearly one of those people that ran like a fountain when she was upset. Burt, on the other hand, was a rock type. Sure, he cried, but not in front of others unless it made them more comfortable to do it themselves. He was there for emotional support.

He didn’t understand either of them. They both seemed overcome by the loss of his parents, but he felt nothing over it. If he felt anything at all, it was annoyance that he had to take time out of his week to be here. He had more important things he could be doing at home. Apparently, they didn’t understand him either.

“It’s okay to cry, my boy. I know you’re trying to be strong for us, but we understand. Losing your parents is a hard thing.” There was Burt being supportive.

“I don’t feel like crying. I don’t really feel anything except that I want my life to go back to normal. Sooner rather than later.”

“That numbness will pass. Then, you can let it all out. It’s healthy. We all grieve in our own way.”

It carried on back and forth for about a half hour. Seth could sense his frustration building. Burt was telling him to let out his emotions, and he was telling Burt he didn’t have any. All the while, Edna was sitting at her end of the table crying to the point of shaking, her plate untouched, and apparently oblivious to the discussion they’d been having.

“Why are you so upset, Edna?” He asked her, hoping for some insight into her world of emotion.

She looked up at him with confusion in her eyes. “They were my best friends.” It was all she could get out between sobs.

He envied her a little, and that made him angry. Why should he be jealous of such a pitiful woman? She can’t even function enough to eat while she sits there emitting enough tears to fill a small lake. What right did she have to be crying? It was his parents that were dead. He wasn’t crying. Watching her weep was becoming unbearable.

“Do you really need to keep crying? You’ve been crying now for almost a week. Why don’t you eat something?”

Edna picked up her fork and started swirling the food on her plate. She looked as though her crying might actually let up. Then, a look crossed her face like she had just remembered something and her tears started up full force again.

“Stop!” He stood as he screamed at her. It just made her cry harder.

“Calm down, son.” Burt chimed in.

“Calm down? How can I be calm with her sitting there wailing?”

“She’s just dealing with losing her friends the only way she knows how.” He was clearly trying to diffuse the situation.

It didn’t help. Here was this frail man trying to control him. He had no power to tell him what to do or how to feel. His rage was building. Without thinking, he swung. He hit Burt square in the jaw, and he dropped to the floor.

Seth looked at his fist, then at Burt lying on the floor. He’d never hit a man before, and he was amazed at the lack of strength it took to knock him to the floor. Edna cried out Burt’s name and Seth looked over at her. Her cry became a whimper. The sound of it grated at his ears. He had to shut her up. He grabbed his steak knife and jabbed it into her throat. She gasped a bit before falling silent. He basked in the silence for a moment.

He heard Burt regaining himself and spun around to face him. Burt stood, looked at his now dead wife, and turned to face Seth with fear in his eyes. Burt turned to run, but he wasn’t fast enough. Seth caught him by the arm and pulled him into his knife. He dropped to the floor, wounded, but not dead. Seth moved to stand directly over him. Burt was stone faced. Such a stubborn old man.

“It’s okay to cry. I know you’re trying to be strong, but I understand. Losing your wife is a hard thing.” He jammed his knife into Burt’s neck and his head fell limply to the side. [/spoiler]

Madysin

[Le_Ministre_de_l_au-dela]

Steve glanced at his watch as he crossed with the light. He would be on time to work, but only if he kept moving. There would be no time to grab some coffee, as he had hoped; but at least he wouldn’t be late.

Time was an obsession with Steve. Thanks to his mother, who instilled in him a feeling that being late was a grievous indiscretion, his day was meticulously planned down to the minute, and regulated by the many clocks in his home, the watch he was never without, and even an hourglass he kept at work. He woke at a certain time, and allotted so much time for coffee, showering, and other morning duties; after which he headed for the gym. His trip to the gym took the same amount of time daily, as did his workout; and his trip home was accounted for as well.

[spoiler]Then, depending on the day, there would be various things that needed doing: Thursday was grocery day, for example, and on Friday, he visited his mother at the seniors’ home; but since she had taken that bad turn, he visited her at the hospital. Regardless of the day’s requirement, he was then off to work, with hopefully time to get coffee from Freddie, who ran the coffee shop down the street. Freddie always suffered from some physical problem, and Steve and his co-workers ran a daily pool on what ailment Freddie would complain of today.

But today, there had been a slight delay in the subway. Nothing serious; but Steve’s train was three minutes late; and because of that, there would be no stopping at Freddie’s.

He arrived at work one minute ahead of schedule. He headed for the rear of the building, where he would spend the next few hours preparing for the real work to be done that night. Work would, as always, be a lot of fun; but it required a lot of preparation.

“You’re a minute early, Steve,” a co-worker named Larry remarked.

“No time for coffee, though,” Steve said sadly. “There was a delay in the subway.”

“There are real delays, and then there are your delays,” Larry replied. “Which was it?”

Steve couldn’t help but chuckle. “Yeah. It was one of my delays—the train was late by three minutes.”

“So no Freddie-pool result today,” Larry sighed. “Well, I’ll still take ‘back pain’ for tomorrow.” He smiled. “And if you want coffee, Peter made some. But it’s Peter’s, so there’s no guarantee it will actually pour. More likely, it’ll ooze.”

“I heard that,” a voice called from across the room.

“Peter, when are you going to learn how to make coffee people can actually drink?” Larry called back.

“When are you going to learn that the best coffee is strong?” Peter replied.

“Well, I’ll try it anyway,” Steve remarked as he headed off to the coffee pot.

“Keep an eye on the time,” Larry teased. “You don’t want to lose a minute to the coffee slowly oozing instead of pouring.”

“I was a minute early,” Steve replied. “I can afford the time.” Larry and Peter both laughed.

This kind of banter was normal among the three. All took their jobs seriously, but the playful conversation helped alleviate the stress of preparing. The topics could be anything: sports, cars, Peter’s coffee, women—and the topic was often women—but the gentle digs and the resulting laughter helped each get into a good mood for the night’s work.

Steve returned with his coffee, checked his watch, and inverted the hourglass he kept at work. In four turns of the hourglass, he would be ready to do his job.

---

“Another round of applause for Laretta Lynnette,” the host enthused. “She’ll be back later tonight; but now, would you please welcome our next performer?”

Steve could hear the host’s announcement and the audience applauding as he made his way to the stage. Headed towards him was a smiling Laretta Lynnette, who was actually Larry, heavily made-up and wearing a wig of big blonde hair, a sequined western-style blouse, and a short skirt trimmed with yet more sequins. “Fun crowd tonight,” Larry said. “And you look amazing. They’ll love you. Have a good set!”

Steve stepped onto the stage. “Ladies and gentlemen, Miss Stephanie St. Clair!” announced the host, waving in Steve’s direction.

“Thanks, Mike,” Steve said to the host, who waved as he left the stage. “Sounds like a great crowd tonight. Let’s have a look at you.” He put his hand over his long-lashed and carefully lined and shadowed eyes, and looked out at the audience.

The audience cheered. Steve—also known as “Stephanie St. Clair”—was a popular performer at the nightclub, and his banter with the crowd was always a pleaser.

“Who do we have over here?” Steve/Stephanie asked, pointing to a couple of businessmen. “Suits? Ties? Gentlemen, this is no place for a business meeting, but if you insist on holding one here, I’ll do my best to make your stock—” Stephanie paused “—rise.” She gave an exaggerated wink.

The audience exploded with laughter. Stephanie smiled and continued. “And who’s over here?” she asked, indicating a group of men sitting by the stage. There were plenty of beer bottles on their table.

“How about some Cher?” one of the group slurred loudly.

“After all that beer? I think you’ve been—sharing—a bit too much already,” Stephanie remarked, to uproarious laughter. When it died down, she continued. “But you’re right; it’s time for some Cher. Don’t you think?” And Stephanie did look like Cher, in a low-cut and slit-to-the-hip gown, over which a wig of long, black, straight hair flowed. “Maestro?”

The music started, and Stephanie started singing. The audience was perfect. It was going to be a great night.

---

“Mom?” Steve asked. “Are you awake?”

“For you, Stevie, I’m always awake,” said the figure in the bed. “How are you?”

“Fine, Mom. How are you?”

“Lousy.”

Steve looked down. “Well, you know—“

“Stevie, we both know my time is measured in days. I feel lousy; that’s a fact. Don’t argue.”

“Alright, I won’t,” Steve agreed, looking up. “You feel lousy. But what is this ‘measured in days’ stuff?”

“Blame the doctors,” Steve’s mother responded. “They said it, not me. In my opinion, I could go on forever.” She collapsed into a coughing fit.

“Those damn cigarettes, Mom.”

“Maybe so,” his mother agreed. “The doctors say they’re killing me.”

“They are, Mom.”

“So you say. Can we go to the park across the street?”

“I’ll check.” Steve flagged a passing nurse. “Can I take my mother to the park?”

“No, sorry,” said the nurse, consulting Steve’s mother’s chart. She’s to stay here. Doctor’s orders.”

“Seriously?” Steve asked. Then, thinking of the reason his mother wanted to go to the park, he asked, “Do cigarettes really matter at this point?”

“No,” said the nurse. “Not now. But the doctor won’t allow his patients to smoke, no matter how far gone they are. I’m sorry.”

Steve looked at his mother. “Sorry, Mom. You heard the lady.”

“Oh, well,” his mother said. Then, in an exaggerated Hollywood-gangster voice, she said, “I’ll bust outta this joint later. They haven’t built a hospital that can keep me in.” They both laughed, though her laughter collapsed into another coughing fit.

When she recovered, she asked, “How’s work, Stevie?”

“It’s good, Mom. Keeps me busy,” Steve replied.

His mother smiled. “I guess it does. It’s a lot of work to turn you into Cher, isn’t it?”

Steve stiffened. “What?”

His mother smiled. “Stevie, I’ve known about your drag queen job for a while now. I just wish I’d been able to see you perform.”

“You knew?”

“Of course I knew,” his mother said. “Remember when you visited that time, and your gym bag opened, revealing breast forms and a lot of makeup, in with your gym clothes?”

Steve smiled bashfully. It was a day when he had not zipped up his bag before visiting. His mother had noted the open bag, but said no more than, “Stevie, close your bag.” And Steve had done so, hoping that his mother had not seen anything other than his sweats and sneakers. Apparently, she had.

“I didn’t care,” his mother continued. “I knew, years ago, that you were not one of those corporate types. You’d do what you wanted to do, whatever made you happy; and if it earned an honest dollar, well, who am I to complain?” She smiled. “So, I’m not complaining.”

Steve looked at the floor. “Glad to hear that, Mom.”

His mother brightened. “Well, listen, Stevie—or Cher or Bette or Barbra or whoever you’re going to be tonight. I may not be able to say this again, so I’ll say it now.” He leaned closer.

“Stevie, I taught you to be always be careful about time. You scheduled things to the max. That’s my fault; I guess, I stressed punctuality. But if I had one piece of advice to give you before I exit, it would be this: if you’re late, it’s not the end of the world.”

Steve looked at his mother. “Huh?”

“Sometimes, we’re in such a hurry to not be late that we miss a lot. ‘Stop and smell the roses’ is more than a maxim; it’s a rule I should have lived by, and should have taught you.” His mother looked Steve in the eye. “Don’t miss out on life because you’re too busy keeping to schedule. Hell, I wish I had enjoyed life more, rather than stressed myself in order to always be on time.”

His mother continued. “Okay, I want a nap. See you next week, Stevie.”

---

There was no next week. Steve’s mother died two days later. The funeral arrangements were easy—his mother had pre-arranged and pre-paid her funeral, so there was little for Steve to worry about. Larry and Peter had attended the funeral, and there were a few people from the hospital and his mothers’ seniors’ home. The minister from the hospital chapel gave a suitable eulogy, and said some prayers, and everything was nice.

Still, Steve considered his mother’s advice to stop and smell the roses. Was it the end of the world if he took time, rather than slavishly keeping to it? He enjoyed talking with Freddie at the coffee shop, for example, but many times, he had to cut their conversations short in order to keep to schedule. But that was his schedule; one he imposed upon himself. Was it really so bad to be a few minutes late in that case? He thought about that for a good while.

---

Steve glanced at his watch as he crossed with the light. He would be on time to work, but only if he kept moving. There would be no time to grab some coffee, as he had hoped; but at least he wouldn’t be late.

But, he realized, what if he was? He remembered the last conversation he had had with his mother, and her advice. Maybe he should stop and smell a few roses.

In spite of the fact that his watch told him he would be late, he went into Freddie’s. “Large cream and sugar,” he ordered.

“You got time, Steve?” Freddie asked, somewhat surprised.

Steve shrugged. “Yeah, I’ve got time.”

“Okay, but I hope you’re not in a hurry. My back is killing me.”

Steve thought about Larry’s perpetual bet. “Well, whenever it’s ready.” Then he cautiously asked, “How’d you get that bad back anyway?” It was something that he had always wondered, but his schedule never gave him time to find out.

“Well, back in my Navy days…” Freddie started, and Steve leaned forward to listen. A good story was a rose worth enjoying—and worth being a few minutes late for. Mom would be proud.
[/spoiler]

Spoons

[Le_Ministre_de_l_au-dela]

There was the question. And the answer. Two questions, really. And two answers. But her mind wandered again to the fob.

Fob. Watch fob. Sophie liked the term though she didn’t quite know exactly what it meant. But it made her think of England and England made her think of Doctor Who and that made her think of — better stop before her train of thought leaves the platform and makes it all the way to Hogwarts.

[spoiler]Well of course that ship had long ago sailed. But wait, wasn’t it a train? Mixing her metaphors again. Her life was one long thought train, she supposed. Or a sailing ship now, she had determined. Was there some pithy idiom about a plane too?

She felt like her life was just one long ship-train-aeroplane of thought fragments. Damn. If only there was some word for ship that rhymed with train and plane. That would make it all nice and neat. And rhymey-wimey as the Doctor might say.

Train works the best, perhaps, since, you know, train of thought. And the thoughts did seem to come, never ending, in discrete packets, like train cars, or photons in a quantum slit experiment. Planes work too, she offered, since the thoughts are also sort of temporary and incorporeal like clouds. The ship thing was just sort of wedged in there though.

Maybe the thoughts come in waves, but that’s a stretch. The ocean was a metaphor better for emotions than thoughts. And she was firmly entrenched in her head, which was perhaps why she was having trouble with a question of the heart.

Flash to some toy her brother had gotten for Christmas when they were kids. It was a robot that transformed into a train and a space shuttle. A triple changer. The ultimate mixed metaphor in the guise of plastic. But, back to the fob.

There was an episode of Doctor Who in which he used a fancy watch to pretend to be human for a while, while hiding out from enemies. She liked to think that a fob had something to do with the engravings on that watch. All pretty and gear like with hints of steam punk. Or perhaps the little doodad you used to wind it up. But words have meanings, real meanings, or at least, tendencies. Better look it up.

Thank you Mr. Dictionary App. Apparently it’s the pocket for the watch. Or the chain. Or the ornament that hangs from the chain. Hmmm. A watch pocket for a pocket watch. Which came first? A real chicken or egg situation.

She looked at her watch. Yes, there was an actual watch that had started the ship-plane-aeroplane of thought fragments. It was an early Christmas gift from her boyfriend Ian, since he’d having a winter break far too busy to visit with her during the real holiday.

It was real pretty and she loved it, but she hadn’t yet tried to guess what station his own train of thought had left from to arrive at the decision to buy it for her. Perhaps it was that aborted phase of steam punk fashion they had all gone through last semester. Or maybe it was that drunken night they had tried to watch all the Harry Potter movies and she had wished out loud that she had a time-turner like Hermione. Or, of course, the Doctor Who watch. People like to go on about the mysteries of women, but boys could be inscrutable, too.

She looked at the watch again. She hadn’t managed to really look at it the first time without spinning off into a million tangents of thought. Tangent. Hmmm. Maybe a math metaphor instead of the boat-train-aeroplane thing? No, back to the watch.

It was sort of reminiscent of those other watches, except in a more feminine way. Especially frilly was the little bell that hung off the bottom. It wasn’t really steampunk, except for the part in the center where you could see through to the gears. Golden colored gears that somehow went well with the red in her hair.

It did have a chain, but she wouldn’t classify it as a hob since it was a necklace chain rather than something you’d clip to your trousers. She decided to see if it would in her change pocket. Snug, but it fit, though it didn’t really belong there. Still, she was surprised it had managed to get in there given how tight her jeans were. Ian’s jeans, really. He was the only boy she knew who wore jeans skinny enough for her to steal. Speaking of jeans, it was getting a little uncomfortable down there.

She went to the bathroom, put the watch back around her neck, and lowered her pants to take out her pad. She looked at it, like some people looked at their boogers after sneezing into a tissue, or others inspected their other eliminations for who knows what purpose.

The usual time of the month redness, yes. But also some worrying clotty bits. She wondered if it had something to do with the abortion. Nay, abortions. Yes, twice, despite being on the pill and using condoms, she had managed to get pregnant. There were two kids who wouldn’t be learning the story of “how I met your mother.” No songs for you, no hymns to HIMYM. Now they were only passengers on her thought aeroplane. Carry–on carrion, corporate class. She flashed to the scene from Juno. “I didn’t know he had it in him.” Indeed.

Maybe it should factor into her decision. It felt like it was a big and important thing, obviously. But it also didn’t seem actually relevant. Except perhaps, for the fact that she had never told him.

Why not? It was sort of about him too, but then again ultimately not. Was she worried about his reaction? He was guilty of the occasional subtle misogyny when it came to women stuff. He clearly had mother issues. Subscriptions really. Subliminal misogyny weekly.

And of course there was the smoking. His inability to even pretend at a normal sleep schedule. His bouts of nihilism. His militant atheism. She was an atheist too, but still somehow believed in a spiritual element to the world. They had argued, but never fought, really. And now it had all turned into shorthand.

Literally. They gave each other messages through their hands. It had started one night when he had particularly pissed her off, but she just hadn’t wanted to get into it. So she gave him the finger. Actually gave it to him. She stuck out her middle finger, grabbed his hand, and placed it around her finger. “Here’s one for you.”

“One?” He asked and smiled. He stuck two fingers in her hand. “Here’s two for you. As in ‘too’, as in you may be pissed, but you love me too.” She tried to hold it in but gave up and burst out laughing.

It evolved first into a series of coded numbers from one to ten. One was “fuck you”. Two was “you love me too”. You’d think three was “I love you” but no, it was four, as in the four words of “and I love you”. Three was a bit odd. It stood for “threesome.” Not the kind with three actual people though.

They had been experimenting with various creative ways to make sex fun by taking turns making up strange little fantasies to play out. The “third wheel” was whatever fantasy one had cooked up.

One of hers started with him wearing only his roommate’s football gear in the shower. It turned her on to imagine she was peeking in on him showering in the locker room after a sweaty game. Maybe all that water had something to do with their birth control issues.

He had a fantasy of her reading naughty stories to him, the kind you might had read in Chaucer’s time, with her hair pulled up and wearing glasses. And the one where he would paint poems onto her naked back. And then of course there was the Doctor Who one. She blushed. Maybe it was time to try out an Inspector Spacetime variation.

After the ten, they had developed a more flexible Helen Keller style alphabet, but they still reverted back to the original ten as needed. Certainly they had a strong connection, even if there were still secrets to be had.

But then there were the issues of his recent troubles. One bored night he and his best friend Sebastian friend had been sitting up on the university hospital roof, drinking and arguing philosophy. Sebastian had been idly tossing the occasional pebble in the air, not realizing they had been landing far below on a campus police car. The hearing hadn’t gone well, and nether did the appeal. They’d let him finish the semester but then he had to go. He had managed to get a transfer to Albany. But that left the question.

She inverted her watch to check the time. The hands were at two and four. Ten after four. That wasn’t right. She held the watch up to her ear. Not ticking. Oh well.

Ian had already been outside for some time, taking drag after drag off cigarettes while he waited for her to come outside and give him her answer to the question. And here it was, would she transfer with him, or make a clean break? Neither of them had felt that a long distance thing could work. Especially since Ian had been burned in that regard previously after a summer fling.

The question and the answer. The ultimate question to the ultimate question. She took out her iPhone and asked Siri “what’s the ultimate answer?”

“According to Douglas Adams, the ultimate answer to life, the universe, and everything is 42.” Of course it is.

“OK, what’s the ultimate question?”

“What’s six by nine?” Ah yes, she recalled from the books. But that was stupid. She flashed back to Doctor Who. The season finale had presented a better, more interesting ultimate question, a question that must never be answered. And it was the same as the title of the series. Doctor who? Maybe 42 was the answer to that question. But how could it be the answer to hers?

Doctor Who. Forty two. Doctor Who. Forty two. Four. Two. Her mouth opened, surprised to discover that what she thought was another tangent had led her instead to her intended destination.

She looked at the watch. Not broken. Not a random winding down of entropy. Hands at four and two.

Two. You love me too. Four. And I love you.

Doctor Who. Forty two. You love me, and I love you.

She had her answer. She went outside to tell Ian.
[/spoiler]

Jackdavinci

[Le_Ministre_de_l_au-dela]

Maybe it was time to try again. Maybe it wasn’t too late.

Lanie was watching hummingbirds in the back yard. It was a summer evening,
almost six-thirty. The letter lay with a small stack of other envelopes on
her black patio table, with a glass of wine beside it. She’d brought the
mail with her when she came outside, bearing the drink. She’d only been in
the house long enough to shuck off her office clothes and fetch the bottle,
chilling in the fridge. It was too nice, despite the haze in the air, to be
inside. She sat on a wrought iron chair that matched the table. The chairs
looked pretty, but they weren’t as comfortable as the old ugly plastic ones,
now stacked behind the shed and out of sight, their white colour long
weathered to algae green and dirt brown.

[spoiler]The other birds that flitted and flew didn’t catch her eye, but the
insistent whir of the hummingbirds always made her look up, trying to spot
them, tiny jewelled miracles of flight and ferocity. For such small birds,
they were so feisty, defending the feeders she’d hung, like tiny fighter
pilots. Now they knew her feeders, they would come and hover near her
sometimes, closer and closer, until they had her attention. Lanie would go
and check, and sure enough, a feeder would be empty. “Okay,” she’d laugh.
“I’ll fill ‘er up.” And she’d go inside and do their bidding, carefully
concocting the mixture of sugar and water. It was such a simple thing to do,
but the rewards were so great.

But today the feeders were full and the birds could ignore her in favour of
whatever it was that hummingbirds did in the summer. Delight her, mostly,
and that was fine.

Lanie swallowed wine, cold and fruity, the taste delicious in her dry mouth,
and avoided looking at the letter mixed in with the other post. Its staid
corporate logo winked at her from under the glass, distorted and changed.

It wasn’t in her mailbox with the rest of the day’s offerings; she’d tucked
it into her purse at the office, and absently stacked it with the regular
mail she’d pulled from the box twenty minutes ago. She’d put her keys away,
and plucked the letter out in their place. She’d toss the real estate cards,
the pizza menus, and the discount oil changes into the recycling bin. She’d
keep the bills to pay, and then decide what to do about The Letter. Later.
After a bit more wine. After supper. She had time to decide, right?

Maybe not.

When she passed forty, Lanie knew she was running out of time. There was
something about forty… that she got over. Forty wasn’t bad. But forty-six?
That was this summer’s number, and she didn’t like it at all. Forty-six was
a grandmother, and Lanie hadn’t even had a child. Forty-six was short hair
and sensible shoes, well into comfortable middle age. Forty-six wasn’t cute.
Forty-six meant that it was too late, and she was no longer fit to wear
miniskirts and heels and pretend that forty was the new thirty. Forty-six
was staring at fifty, and Lanie wasn’t ready for that. At all.

Next door, something enticing from Paul’s barbecue drifted into Lanie’s back
yard, savoury and teasing. Steak or chicken? It didn’t matter. She’d set out
her little table and chairs angled between the garden shed on one side and
the fence on the other. That way Lanie could sit in her back without feeling
that her neighbours’ eyes were on her. And in just three years, the
rhododendrons had thickened, and reached still higher every spring, giving
her even more privacy. Lanie topped up the glass. She’d have to mow the lawn
in the next few days, if the summer rain held off. Tonight, she’d finish her
wine, toss the junk mail, make dinner, and decide.

And things could be so much worse. There was something to bask in tonight,
and it was in her letter. The job offer in writing, if she wanted it. All
she had to do was decide—stay or go? It was all good news, right?

“Right,” Lanie said aloud and drank.

But Lanie liked her back yard. She never knew how much she’d like having a
back yard, until this unlovely plot of ground became hers, and she fell in
love with the pleasure and work of transforming it. When she got home from
the office, if it wasn’t raining and it wasn’t cold, she went out into the
back. In early spring, she’d follow the sun around, greedy for its first
warmth, and in July and August she’d move into the shade. She’d read, and
work on the yard—read, and weed. Read, and water the planters. Read, and
drink wine, and make changes to the back yard. It was nicer every year.
She’d done it for three summers now, alone most of the time. And three
summers was enough for it to seem like she’d been doing it forever. Three
summers was long enough to see the changes: a flower garden bloomed where
once was only weeds. Rhododendrons coaxed back to abundant colour. A small
rock wall. Summer meant reading, drinking wine, and puttering around her
garden, until evening came, and dusk made it too dark to see the pages.

It was a piece of time, all her own. A peaceful time, between the frenzy of
the office and its million headaches, and sleeping alone in her bed. Of
course, the wine helped.

The sun had emerged from the haze, and moved around, changing the angle of
the light. It brought the roses into the low, slanting rays, thickly gold.
The level in her wine bottle seemed to have changed as well. Did she want to
lose this house? To move, and start all over again, in a new office, a new
city? To invert her life?

“I don’t know,” Lanie said, but the hummingbirds didn’t have answer. They
drank nectar to fly, to fly to catch the bugs, to feed the babies, to pass
along their brief lives to the next generation. In the end, wasn’t that all
that mattered? To be alive for a little while, and then leave it in the
hands—or wings—of the next generation, the one you gave life to? Lanie
hadn’t given life to anything, except the flowers in the back yard. So,
she’d hate to leave it, not when she hadn’t yet seen what those bulbs she
put in last fall looked like. Maybe now she’d never know. What a drag. But
why stay? With no husband, no child. No boyfriend. Just a job, and a house.
The back yard, and a pile of novels to lose herself in. And a bottle of wine
for company.

She should go make a proper dinner. With salad. It wasn’t like Paul next
door was going to share his steak, and the smell was driving her crazy.

Instead, Lanie sorted out the junk mail, and let it flutter into the blue
bin by the back door. She went in and came out again with some cheese and
crackers, and a thick paperback mystery. She drank more wine as she nibbled,
and set the plate over the letter so she wouldn’t see it. She’d think about
it later. In the meantime, there was wine, cheese and crackers. A good book,
and roses in bloom. Life was good. So, it wasn’t steak, but life was good.

It could have been very different news in that letter.

It could have been what most people were getting these days, and that was a
formal advisement of her layoff notice. Lanie had been half-expecting that;
rumour was the corporate office was cutting staff again. She’d wondered how
it would change her life, if she was one of the ones getting bad news. What
would she do… would she be able to keep the house? Until she actually read
the letter, she’d been bracing herself to join the ranks of the jobless. At
forty-six. She’d been living frugally for the last three years—buying the
house had scared her, and made a stringent budget to follow (with a generous
allowance for wine in the summertime in lieu of an actual holiday somewhere)
and had pretty much stuck to it. If she were laid off, she could finally…

Do what? What did she want to do? Lanie didn’t know. She hadn’t had to think
about it for a long time.

Stay, and be in the firing line for the next round of cuts, an ungrateful
employee? Go, and uproot herself, for a little more money and a title that
looked good on a business card, but really meant nothing? If she went, it
wouldn’t be with stars in her eyes any more. She’d have to work hard, and do
the job of three managers for the price of one, only slightly more expensive
one. She already came home exhausted most days of the week, with a headache
from too much paper, too many emails, and too many missed lunches. Taking on
more in a new city would be a high price for her to pay, even with the
raise. And she’d be doing so for a company that had ruthlessly shed people
in the midst of a terrible time to lose a job. And she’d have to be the one
making those cuts in the future. Lanie had no doubt that lean and mean was
the direction of the future.

The rich got richer, despite everything, didn’t they?

The hummingbirds argued in agitated clicks and chirps. Lanie had finished
her crackers, but still sipped wine. She didn’t feel like dinner now; she’d
have a piece of fruit later, and she’d be fine. The rich got richer, and the
middle class dropped like executed prisoners into the ditch of poverty. Hard
times had come again.

“So, go to hell,” she said. It was past seven now, the colour of the light
changing, the softness of a summer evening’s beauty surrounding her. Or
maybe it was the wine.

Maybe it was because she didn’t want to be working with Andrew again.

“Ain’t that the truth,” Lanie solemnly advised the back yard. Cheerful
pansies nodded at her from a pot by the corner of the shed.

Lanie stood, stretching. Her rear end probably had the imprint of the design
of the silly iron chair. She ambled around the yard, carrying her glass,
pinching off wilted blossoms, and dropping them into the big bucket that
she’d dump into the compost. Nothing should be wasted. The dead flowers
would be born again as new soil. Next year. Would she be here to turn it
over, to make it bloom again?

Or would she be in some tiny condo in an eastern city, surrounded by people
on all sides, rushing, rushing, pressing in on her? And working with Andrew
again?

Andrew, and his quirky smile. Did he still have all his hair? What did
forty-six look like on him? Probably good. Things were like that for him.
The rich got richer, and the handsome got better-looking with age.

Andrew. What was he doing now? She still head his name coming up at the
office. Mentioned here and there, sometimes in type. As it was at the bottom
of the letter. He’d authored the letter—or more likely, his assistant had.
There was nothing to Lanie and Andrew now: just colleagues, people who
worked for the same company. Nothing more, now.

She dragged of the ugly plastic chairs back to the table. To heck with
appearances. It was her back yard. And Lanie had her back yard, the birds
reminded her. She was content with her life, here in the warm light of
summer. She didn’t need a promotion, and she didn’t even need the increase
in salary it would bring. Let the chips fall where they may, then—she’d
decline the transfer, and stay where she was. Where she wouldn’t have to see
him again, to smile at his lovely young wife at a company outing, to see the
pictures of his children in silver frames on his desk. A boy and a girl,
she’d heard, as lean and athletic as their father. Full of promise, just
like him. Full of promises, maybe, just like him.

Lanie didn’t trust Andrew’s promises. They’d nearly broken her twelve years
ago.

Twelve years ago. Where did the time go? She’d blinked, and it was gone.
She’d thought there’d be time to find someone else. Time to do everything.
How had twelve years, fifteen, even twenty, slipped away so quickly?

Time was lost, but maybe time could be found. And just maybe it was time to
try again.

To do what—love? Be kinder? Be better? The letter meant that her career was
a success, that she was valued. Lanie was good at her job. “Damn good,” she
told the back yard. Maybe it was time to let go of the need to keep proving
herself, to stop spending every lunch hour at her desk, to stop bringing
work home for the weekend, stop checking her email with her morning coffee.
She should be drinking her coffee out here in the back yard before work, and
maybe, just maybe, spend a little less time drinking wine out here after
work. Maybe it was even time to try dating again.

Lanie made a face at the prospect. She was forty-six. God only knew what was
out there. The whir of wings, beating so quickly they were invisible, was in
her ear again. There it was, a tiny emerald darting, green fire glinting in
the last rays of the sun, against the deep jade and pink of the rhododendron
abloom.

Her watch was tossed on the bureau in the bedroom, but Lanie knew it was
time. A time of crossroads. She could take the promotion, live in the big
city, and have nothing but her job and the reminder of all that she’d wanted
and lost every time she saw Andrew, or read his name. Or she could stay
here, and try to live a real life. With something more than a bottle of wine
and the company of birds. She was single. She had nothing to lose for
trying. The biggest regrets, Lanie knew now, weren’t what you did. She
didn’t regret loving Andrew. Losing him, of course. But loving him? Never.

The most cutting regret was for what you didn’t do. And what would she say
she did this summer?

She watched birds, and the level in the bottle go down.

It was almost eight-thirty and soon it would be too dark to read. It was
almost time to go inside, and bid farewell to the falling light of the back
yard. Just a swallow or three more, listening to the birdsong and the radio
from the Henderson’s kitchen window. Dusk. Sometimes it was the sweetest
time of the day. A moment or two more to watch the hummingbirds, thrumming
and fighting and living, and maybe even loving.

Then Lanie would go inside, and write that letter of her own. She finished
the wine, and inverted the glass, leaving a wet circle as round as the
wedding ring Andrew wore. It would be easier to turn the offer down with the
bottle of pinot grigio warming her belly. She’d write it tonight before she
changed her mind.
[/spoiler]

Savannah

[Le_Ministre_de_l_au-dela]

“Hello, and welcome to TimeBubble, Mister York. I’m Darlene Pritchard, Customer Service.” She gestured to the padded armchairs in front of her desk.

“It’s very nice to meet you, Darlene, and you can call me Michael. This is Jasmine,” Michael said. He and the teenaged girl sat down. “I know a bit about what you do here, but I’d love to get the spiel. You have a bubble machine here in your office, right?”

[spoiler]“Yes.” Darlene considered her unusually well-informed customers as she prepared the bubble generator controls. She didn’t know any more about them than names, and didn’t like to ask personal questions before giving the generic pitch. But they could be father and daughter - was he diagnosed with a terminal disease? That was the lion’s share of TimeBubble’s consumer customer base. He might want to make sure that he was around for Jasmine’s high school graduation day, or college, or walk her down the aisle on her wedding day…

“Okay, Jasmine, could you give the bell a swing?” she said, indicating the pendulum suspended the ceiling. The little brass bell was on the very end of the pendulum, and immediately above it was a custom quartz watch face with a minute hand, second hand, and a third hand that went a full circle in exactly two seconds.

Jasmine pulled the bell towards her, and let it go. The bell rang several times as it swung, before Darlene pushed the button to activate the field. Suddenly the pendulum was flying through the air much more slowly, its motion just visible. On the watch face, the second hand appeared quite still, and the faster hand was doing a good impression of a second hand.

“Remarkable,” Michael breathed, smiling. When the tiny bell rang inside the field, it sounded like a gong, but immensely far away. “There’s something odd about the colors in the bubble.”

“That’s due to frequency shifts,” Darlene explained. “The light from the fluorescents is red-shifted as it enters the bubble, reflects off the watch, and the bell, and then blue-shifted back as it leaves the bubble. Our standard slow-time bubble rooms aren’t exposed like this one, of course - the room is sealed while the bubble is in effect, which can be for a set period of time, as requested by your loved ones outside, or when you hit the panic button from inside. They’re rated safe for human use up to a dilation factor of two thousand, which means that one year, outside, is experienced subjectively as four hours, twenty-three minutes. Or, as I like to think of it, a pleasant afternoon with a good book.”

“I’m not interested in a standard room, Darlene,” Michael said. “What I have in mind will take considerably more effort, and I’ll be happy to fund the necessary construction, but the project will need the experience of TimeBubble engineering staff - not to mention the use of your patented technology.”

That took the wind out of her usual pitch. “Alright, could tell me what you have in mind?”

“Can you invert the bubble effect with this demonstration unit?” Michael waved at the still slowly moving pendulum, and Darlene turned off the bubble to return it to normal time. “Speed it up so that time passes more quickly in there?”

Darlene had to check the interface before she answered. “Yes, I’ve got a negative dilation of up to four times.” Hoping that this option had actually been field tested, she punched it in, and the pendulum started waving back and forth like crazy. It was hard to focus on the watch face, but she had the impression that the second hand was covering ground at a decent rate. “Michael - do you want to live inside a time bubble where time passes more quickly?”

“Not Michael,” Jasmine said. “It’s for me.”

“Why?”

“Well, partly so that I can finish my studies, and graduate in four months… and then I’ll be twenty-two, and he won’t even be a year older.” Jasmine smiled over at Michael, and it was not the affection of a daughter for her father, but a different kind of love in her look. Darlene felt a bit sick.

“I’m not going to bore you with the details of how we came to correspond without either truly knowing the age of the other,” Michael said. “Neither of us was looking for love, but that’s what we found. And I’m sure that if your tech boys could whip up a four times fast-time field for a demo unit in your office that you’ve never used that way before, they can do much better for my Darlene.”

“Let me get this straight,” Darlene muttered. “You want to use a TimeBubble to close the age gap? Why don’t you go in for a slowdown, sir, while Jasmine grows up normally?” York had to be in her own age bracket, nearly forty.

“I’m too busy to sit four years out of my life,” Michael said, the corners of his face turning down. “And Jasmine really does want to finish her degree early. She’s already got conditional approval from Harvard to finish her bachelor’s by correspondence. They were excited about the possibilities.”

Darlene stood up. “I’m sorry, Mister York. I don’t think that TimeBubble can help you out.”

Michael sprawled into his chair. “Is that really your call, Miz Pritchard? Because if it’s your final answer, my next appointment is with Sanford, and I’ll tell him exactly what I think of his Customer Service.”

Darlene had to put her hands on the table to catch her balance. Better to take this to Zeke herself - and see what she could do to influence his decision. “Of course I’ll be happy to consult with the rest of the executive team, and get back to you with the final decision.”

“That’s more like it,” Michael said, standing up again. “Just make sure you tell them that money is no object.”

At that moment, Darlene suddenly placed his name and face. He was that Michael York - majority stakeholder in York Thermonuclear, and the ninth richest man in the world. “Yes, sir.” Head down to hide her blush, Darlene beat a hasty retreat from her own office.

“We can’t do this, Zeke,” Darlene said. “If we let him drag her into that fast-time room, then we’re complicit in the consequences as long as it’s TimeBubble tech. York could be coercing her, and even if he isn’t, there’s the question of being secluded for four years of her life.”

Zeke Sanford shuffled papers in front of him. “Miss Holbrooke has arranged for long-distance correspondence with dozens of college students in the full age range for undergraduates.”

“That’s hardly a replacement for seeing people in person, on a day to day basis.”

Zeke considered that a moment. “Darlene, I’ll tell it to you straight. I understand your concerns here, but if there’s a way I can get this project underway, there’s no way I can turn it down. Let’s see… we’ll start with arranging for a psych consult for Miss Holbrooke, just to make sure that she’s reasonably stable, and I’ll be certain to bring in the ethicist and public relations. As far as personal socialization…”

“We can’t just leave her sitting in that room, studying her mail-order textbooks and writing out letters to her pen-pals,” Darlene said.

“Yes, I understand,” Zeke snapped. Darlene held her breath, hoping that she hadn’t seriously crossed the line. “With the amount of money that Michael’s ready to throw in, I think that we can think outside the box,” he mused. “What if we could recruit other people to stay inside the bubble with Jasmine? Other college students, to start with - she can’t be the only one who might want to get a degree in just a few months of calendar time. Before the state of technology shifts too much, or more species go extinct.” He snapped his fingers. “Clinical trials - I know somebody over at Jackson-Major who might want in, or know who to talk to. Not every trial, I know, but anything where speed is critically important. In fact, there might be a lot of manufacturing cases where speed would be worth the expense and logistics of setting up a fast-time bubble.”

“I guess there’s that.” Businesses setting up in fast-time didn’t give Darlene that sinking feeling.

“Okay. I’ll talk to Mister York, and tell Sally in public relations to start recruiting college students who want to fast-track their degrees. You can take point with engineering. Considering the resupply issues, they’ll probably need a twenty-fold time compression factor to manage four years in four months.”

“Any idea how big a bubble we’ll need?”

“I’ll keep you posted, but let’s aim for ballroom-size.”

Darlene waved vaguely as she came into the observation room. “How’s the test going?”

“I think that we’ve got the field stable.” Bob Clarkson waved at the window, through which they could see a large testing area, with TimeBubble employees zipping around here and there, working at desks and so on - all in crazy colors. Since the light was generated inside the time bubble, it was only shifted once as it left the test room. “Compression factor of twenty to one, over three thousand square feet.”

“Yeah, that sounds about right for our ‘pilot project’ of twenty people.” Darlene agreed with a sigh. “So, what’s the next step?”

“I’ve got a meeting with York’s architectural engineers this afternoon, to consult on the requirements.” Bob said. “They’ll need to supply for a subjective day in less than an hour when we drop the field every cycle. It shouldn’t be too hard - good air and water can be pumped in, toilet tank contents and bad air pumped out, food and any durable goods carried inside, computers inside and outside linking up over the fiber network connection.”

Darlene shook her head. “I still don’t feel right about what we’re doing here. We’ve got twelve students signed up now, and some kind of a medical experiment with one investigator and six paid subjects. I just… I didn’t think I was in this business.”

“Is it really that different from putting the old and the sick in cold storage until they’re ready to come out?”

“That was something I could take pride in.” Darlene sighed. “I wonder when they’re going to sign up the twentieth person for the pilot project. I… I wish that there was something that I could do for the kids.” Then her head cocked up slightly. “Wait a second… maybe there should be a TimeBubble employee inside the fast-time bubble. A prominent part of the customer service team, perhaps.”

“Zeke’ll like that angle, I think,” Bob said. “But - you want to go in yourself? Wouldn’t that make it look like you’re approving the whole affair, including Michael and Jasmine’s love affair?”

“It’s going to happen whether I approve or not, Bob,” Darlene pointed out. “This is something that might make things better for Darlene and the others. If the need arises, I’ll know when to hit the power button, and how to get something done right afterward.” She chuckled. “You know, I’m not too worried about Michael and Jasmine.”

“Why not?”

“Well, it’s one thing for an eighteen-year old girl to say that she’ll wait four years for her boyfriend. But a lot can change in that time - and there are a few cute boys her own age who’ll be going into the bottle too.” Darlene picked up the phone and dialed the president’s office.

“Zeke, I’ve got a proposal for you. Is the last spot in the fast-track project still open?”

“Well, we’ve got a sophomore in Oregon who’s trying to see if he can swing grad-school credit for the last month. Why?”

“I want to go in myself, as corporate representative.”

“Oh.” Zeke considered a moment. “Get packed, and have a great four years.”
[/spoiler]

chrisk

[Le_Ministre_de_l_au-dela]

“Cool necklace!” said the cashier.

My mind had been elsewhere, and it was a moment before I realized he was talking to me.

“Oh, thanks,” I stammered, smiling quickly at him and glancing down at the object of his admiration.

---

[spoiler]It had come into my possession just a few weeks earlier. My mother had passed away several months ago, and her sister, my aunt Linda, had agreed to take care of her personal effects. I appreciated the help. I didn’t live in the area anymore, and besides, my mom didn’t have all that much. My father had died several years before, and Mom had sold the house and moved into a retirement home, taking just the essentials – clothes, housewares – and a few keepsakes. I told my aunt that I didn’t need “things” to remember my mother, and I certainly didn’t need any more clutter. I said she could give everything to charity. But she gently suggested that later, when my memories of my mother, and the pain of losing her, had begun to fade a little, I’d be glad to have some mementos of her. I realized she was probably right.

A couple of months later, I received a package from Aunt Linda. Along with my mother’s things, she’d enclosed some of her famous shortbread cookies, and a note:

“Dear Jenny,

I hope you’re doing well. I’ve selected a few things I thought you might enjoy, even if you decide not to keep them. I miss Kitty very much. She brought a great deal of joy to my life. She loved you more than anything, and was incredibly proud of you, as am I. I hope we can see each other again soon, under happier circumstances.

Love,

Aunt Linda”

Tears rolled down my cheeks, and I let them. I was tired of crying, tired of mourning, but as my mother used to say, “The only way from here to there is through.” There is no detour around pain, no shortcut. The only way to get past it is to go through it. So I cried, and I waited. When I was ready, I took a bite of a cookie, and spread my mother’s things out on the table.

My aunt had chosen well. There were my mother’s high school yearbooks, leather bound, with “Katherine Ann McKee” embossed in gold. A few dozen photos from her childhood. Her jewelry box. And some pictures and poems I had made for her as a child, including one I had decorated with pressed flowers, taken from the lush garden she planted in our front yard every year.

I opened the jewelry box. It had a bunch of little drawers and special containers for rings, earrings, and so on, but they were all empty; my mother, in her typical careless fashion, had just tossed everything into the main compartment willy-nilly. In my mind, I started to chastise her as I had so many times: “You know, it wouldn’t take you any longer to put things where they belong…” Then I stopped. There was no point to that now – and really, was there ever? She never would have changed, no matter what I said. I chuckled, at myself and at her, and shook my head. “She was who she was,” I sighed, and began to sort through the glittering tangle.

So many of the items were ones I’d rarely, if ever, seen her wear. She saved most of her jewelry for special occasions, which tended to be few and far between. When I was very little, my parents were always going out to dinner or dancing, but over time, my father seemed to lose interest. Every now and then, my mother was able to drag him out of the house, and even went out on her own a few times, but eventually, she gave up entirely.

It was a shame; she’d always loved to get all decked out. I remembered fondly watching my mother go through the elaborate process of dressing up: a girdle, expensive stockings, her best silk slip, her “fancy” dress – silk brocade with a rainbow of jewel-toned flowers. Next, makeup, which consisted solely of mascara and bright red lipstick. And in truth, she didn’t even need that. Everyone thinks their own mother is beautiful, but with her long, dark hair and huge, sorrowful eyes, she really was. Second to last, and most exciting for me, high heels. I liked to imagine myself as a grown-up lady, teetering around on impossibly tall stilettos, elegant and awkward like a flamingo. Then finally, jewelry. Bracelets, earrings, necklace, and rings – and none of it matched. Maybe a decorative brooch as well. On anyone else, it would have been just too much, but somehow, on my mother, it all came together. She always looked regal, refined.

She had definitely worn this bracelet, I was sure. I remembered its bright green glass beads, in which you could see an inverted version of the world, a tiny, topsy-turvy Emerald City. I’d seen her in that long string of pearls once or twice. It was so long that it wrapped around three times and still dangled to her waist. But the only other items I really recognized, the only ones that held any sentimental value for me, were the two pieces she wore every single day: a little pair of diamond studs, and a necklace – a watch on a silver chain. I was actually surprised to find them; I would have thought she wanted them to be buried with her, like her wedding ring. I felt a sudden rush of guilt. I couldn’t believe I hadn’t noticed she wasn’t wearing them at the funeral. But it was too late now. At least my aunt hadn’t given them away, and I was deeply grateful for that.

I picked up the studs, twirling them between my fingers so their tiny facets caught the light. I put one in my right ear, then the other in my left. I put the necklace around my neck, and looked in the mirror. I turned my head from side to side, admiring the earrings. They were small, but really quite pretty. Then I saw I had put the necklace on backwards; the watch was facing inward. As I unclasped it, still looking in the mirror, I suddenly noticed that there was an engraving on the back:

“Darling Kitty

Yours Always

Love Robert”

Robert?

My father’s name was John. Edwin John, actually, but he’d always hated Edwin. Who was Robert? Apparently an old flame, from before she met my father. It seemed a little strange that she would wear the necklace every day. Perhaps it was her little way of needling my father for refusing to take her out on the town more often. I would never have suspected such a thing from her; she had always seemed somewhat cowed by my father. I was tickled that she had found a way to stand up for herself, however small and subtle, and I was again grateful to my aunt for giving me the chance to see this side of her.

I closed the jewelry box, took another cookie, and gave Aunt Linda a call, to thank her for saving these wonderful mementos for me.

“And bless you for sending the cookies – I’m already on my fifth one!”

“You’re so welcome. I’m so glad you enjoyed seeing everything.”

“I did, I definitely did. But I have to ask,” I added, jokingly adding a tone of shock and disapproval, “Who was Robert?”

She gasped, and I laughed in anticipation of the tale of the dashing young rogue who let my mother get away. But Aunt Linda didn’t laugh. Quickly and quietly, the words spilled out:

“Oh, Jenny, I’m so sorry. She never meant for you to find out. I insisted she had to tell your father, but we agreed it was best if you never knew. I thought she’d gotten rid of everything of his, but she was so careless. I guess I was, too. I’m so sorry, Jenny – “

“Wait.” My ears were buzzing. I swallowed the cookie, and it went down like a lump of sawdust.

“Wait, what? She… she had an affair?”

Aunt Linda sighed. “She did.”

“Was it a one-time fling, or…”

“Oh, Jenny. I’m so sorry…”

“Please stop saying that.”

“Sorr- I mean, okay. No. I don’t know how long it lasted, but it was a while.”

I strained to keep from screaming. “What’s ‘a while’, months? Years?”

“Quite a few years, as far as I know.”

“Who was he?”

“Someone she knew in college, before your parents got together. He moved away, but they met again after she married your father and had you.”

“After – so he couldn’t have been my father?”

“No. That was one thing she wanted me to be clear about. And you know you’ve always been the spitting image of your dad.” This was true.

“Was she… did they…”

“Sweetie, I’m sorry. Sorry, yes, you asked me to stop - . Well. I don’t know too many more details. She told me they saw each other now and then, but I think they mostly sent letters. She loved him very much – but she also loved your father. She was very conflicted about it; that’s why she told me. She wanted my advice.”

“And what did you tell her?”

“I told her to come clean. I said your father deserved to know. She was so scared of losing everything.”

“Well, did she tell him?”

“She said she had, but then nothing happened. I half expected him to divorce her, but neither of them acted any differently, or said a peep about it. So I decided I had to ask him. I went to him, and I just said, ‘Did Kitty mention Robert?’ And his face went bright red, and he nodded.”

“That’s it? Did he say anything?”

“All he said was, ‘She is who she is.’ We never talked about it again.”

I was silent for a moment as I laid these new facts on the table along with my mother’s possessions, struggling in vain to incorporate them into the image of the mother I had known. Was this why my father had stopped taking her out, why he’d grown cold and distant? Or was it the other way around? Had she sought affection elsewhere when he wouldn’t give it? What made them decide to stay together? Why on Earth did she wear this necklace every single day? How could she do that to my father? How could he stand for it? None of it made any sense, and it never would.

In the days that followed, I felt my sense of loss magnified a hundred-fold. Not only would I no longer have my mother, I had never had “my mother” to begin with, it seemed. In all my memories, she had been replaced with a stranger. Then one day, out of the blue, I realized: in order to hold onto the memories of the mother I loved, I had to make room for all of her. I had to accept that, impossible as it seemed, she was an adulterer, not instead of, but in addition to, all of the other wonderful things she had been to me. That was when I began to wear the necklace every day.

---

I glanced back up at the cashier, and he smiled.

“Is it, like, an antique? Family heirloom?”

“Yes.” I took a breath, and let it out. “It was my mother’s.”

[/spoiler]

Heart of Dorkness

[Le_Ministre_de_l_au-dela]

Day one.

First day on the new job! I can’t believe I got it with my school record and all… these guys must be desperate! It’s just regular security patrols around a construction site, but we’re on a tropical island! Some kind of resort, around a bay with with a port and everything. They flew us down, took care of the visas and passports, everything! We had to sign a lot of paperwork before boarding, and the flights took a long time. The last part taxiing into the harbor on a floatplane like in Fantasy Island was pretty cool. This is way better than parking-lot work in Chicago in January!

[spoiler]Day two.

Still getting settled in. These barracks look brand new. Not many people here yet. They’re good joes so far, except for this one guy. Just sits and stares in the corner. Some of the others said he came from 'Nam. Doesn’t seem the right age.

We’re just the basic security. Mall cops, really. There’s a team from Corporate who handle the VIPs and such.

Day three.

Looks like the kitchens are still under construction as well. The food here sucks. Maybe we could go out and pick coconuts or something. At least the patrols are uneventful. More people arrive every day.

Day four.

At least the stars are bright. Wish I knew the constellations though… might be able to tell where we are.

Day five.

Payday! We’re paid once a week, but not in cash. We get a bankbook and they keep track of stuff. They say it’ll cut down on fights, and having heard the stories out of Fort Mac, I believe them. There’s a store where we can buy stuff against our accounts. When we go back home, we can withdraw money. We can send it to people as well.

Pay’s worth it though. You should have seen Maria’s eyes pop when I told her how much! Almost made the argument about six months until the next break worth it. I arranged to send half home. No letters so far. (We pick them up at the store as well, so I guess it’s a post office too.)

More guys arrived today. The barracks is almost full. The next one is almost finished. Creepy Stare Guy still hasn’t talked much, and there are a few idiots, but things are okay so far. Only two fights.

Day six.

I was patrolling up where the main resort is going in, in the hills overlooking the bay. The place looks almost finished, but there’s a LOT of construction going on further back.

Day seven.

Weekend! What to do?

Bugger. No beer at the store. Musta missed that in the orientation lecture back home.

Went for a walk. (Yeah, I know. I do that for a living. But I was bored, dammit.) There’s an awful lot of areas marked as “out of bounds”. The gang up at Corporate must be paranoid, even more than us.

Wrote a letter home to Maria and the kids. No stamps at the store. They said they send in bulk or something; just address it and put it in the box.

Day eight.

Back to work. Short weekend. Same old same old. Another new barracks going up next to ours.

Day nine.

Creepy Stare Guy is gone from the barracks! One of the others said he got in a fight, and Corporate came and took him away. They even made his bed; it’s like he was never there.

Day ten.

So that’s what all those pylons are for. A friggin’ monorail. What is this, Disney?

Day eleven.

Disney? Could be. It certainly looks like a Disney resort in places. But I thought the new one was cancelled, and usually there’s rumors if one is going in.

On patrol today, Marty got bit by something. He went to the infirmary, they said it was minor, but he’s still complaining.

Day twelve.

Payday. Marty didn’t look well when we got back from our patrols. He’s in the infirmary.

Day thirteen.

Marty looks a lot better. Managed to get a long weekend out of it as well. Bastard.

Day fourteen.

Weekend. We were sitting on the beach when Marty jumped up. Claims he saw Creepy Stare Guy in the jungle. When we looked, nothing there. Of course. Good joke though.

Looking through my paperwork. My benefits don’t kick in till the third month, that’s normal, but Maria and the kids get their benefits immediately! Gaah! What a way to get people to stick around.

Day fifteen.

Back to work. Patrols as normal. Getting to know the area a little better, getting used to the night sounds. The orientation lectures don’t really do it justice. And yes, there’s that stereotypical jungle bird call.

Day sixteen.

Even busier at the port. A couple of pretty big ships offshore, and they’re barging stuff in. The road’s done up to the resort and the place beyond. My theory now is that this is some hush-hush corporate headquarters, and they don’t want to let on how much it’s costing…

Day seventeen.

Notice went up. Martial arts classes. Mandatory martial arts classes. We gotta upgrade our skills. Fine with me, but what are they expecting? Commandos? There go half the weekends though.

Day eighteen.

They’re putting in a pipeline next to the road. Guess what? We have to patrol it as well.

Day nineteen.

Payday. My invisible salary, piling up.

Day twenty.

Letter from Maria! She got my first pay transfer. She got benefits cards in the mail as well!

Miss her. Miss her miss her miss her miss her miss her. And it’s not private enough here.

Day twenty-one.

Weekend. Ow. Dammit, I hurt. I didn’t know I was that much out of shape. That martial arts instructor is one evil bastard. I’d like to break a board over his head.

And they want us to do drills every day.

Day twenty-two.

They’re not kidding about the drills. When we got back from patrol, two guys were missing. Hadn’t shown up for the drills. Corporate came and got 'em.

Day twenty-six.

Payday. I’m not going to mention this again unless something happens. Getting used to drills every day. Have not written much, just too tired.

Day twenty-eight.

Weekend! Well, what’s left of it, after the MA lessons and drills. Just want something to read. Even a newspaper. And I haven’t heard a news report since we came down here. What a drag. MISS MARIA.

Day thirty-five.

Weekend. Usual remark about martial-arts lessons and drills. I am getting stronger though. More endurance.

Day thirty-six.

More lessons! Firearms lessons. Beginner, intermediate, advanced, depending on what we knew. I’m beginner, but looking at the list, I see machine guns mentioned. Where the heck are we, anyways? Maria said my letters came with Australian stamps, but does Australia have volcanic islands like this? Or machine guns?

Day thirty seven.

Aircraft overhead. Some kind of hovering helicopter-like thing, but with small rotors, not one big rotor. They went up to headquarters.

Day forty-three.

The headquarters looks almost finished, as far as I can tell from here. Lotta activity. Aircraft coming and going.

Day ???

I’ve lost count of the frickin’ days. No calendars here either. Maria’s letters are still coming, but I think they’re being edited. No dates on them, for one thing. She says she’s getting mine.

Day ???

Is it three months yet?

Day ???

“Security has been sent into the jungle.” They always say that. Makes it sound like things are under control. But they aren’t. Someone came ashore last night, and we didn’t catch them at all.

Day ???

Someone attacked the monorail. Tried to break into headquarters, but they repelled them. Which means we have to find them.

Day ???

Corporate said they got them. At least we don’t have to worry about finding them, but we got no sleep last night, and back on regular schedule today. Stumble through the jungle, yay!

Day ???

Aircraft went out to sea. Came back after dark.

Day ???

Place is like they kicked over a hornet’s nest. Dunno why. Patrols doubled.

And they’ve got security cams all over the place. And didn’t tell us. What are we, chopped liver?

Day ???

Marty said someone launched a rocket out of the peak. I, of course, was on patrol in a frickin’ cave, face-to-face with a banana slug. Not sure whether to believe him.

Day ???

Chasing someone through the jungle. More than one someone. Explosions in the distance. I’m beginning to see where that 'Nam vet was coming from.

And whose brilliant idea were those one-man flying whirly things, anyways? None of them came back. Just us sloggers. Less flash, more slash, that’s us.

Day ???

The black Corporate jets have been coming and going all week.

Day ???

Am I going to make it to the six-month holiday? I don’t even know what day it is. And why won’t the people at the store tell me anything?

Day ???

I found something in the jungle. Looks like a pocketwatch, but it’s got this crystal in the middle. Heavy little bugger as well.

Day ???

Corporate called us into a meeting. Said they just beat off a hostile takeover attempt, and apologized for the inconvenience! Dunno whether to believe them. Part of me says yes, and part of me thinks it’s fake.

Seven days to go!

Suddenly they decide to let everyone know what date it is and everything. Turns out it’s only a week till my six-month holiday and return to the mainland. Maria!!!

Six days to go!

Regular night patrol. Thought I saw a submarine in the bay. Looked again, saw nothing. Reported it anyways.

Five days to go!

Playing with the pocketwatch. Twiddled the stem, and suddenly everything went WHARNGG. It was like a photographic negative for a second, all the colors inverted. Then everything was normal.

I suppose I should report it, but dammit, this place is getting to me. When I leave, I’m taking it.

Four days to go!

Rumor is that Corporate’s been asking whether

???

Battle. Commandos came ashore, Corporate’s been fighting them, us too. Got hit. Woke up on battlefield. Bruises, must have been protected by bodies. Oh god, the bodies. Need water

???

Found other survivor. Alan. Big fire inland. Can hear fighting. Explosions.

???

We made camp. Alan’s been delirious since I found him. Went looking for something to bind his wounds. Wish I’d remembered more of that first-aid class.

Explosions bigger. Got to get to beach.

???

Later. Get to beach, carrying Alan. I feel strangely okay, considering.

???

Earthquake! Or bloody big bomb. The peak looks like a volcanic eruption. Hear more fighting, getting closer.

What’s happening to me? I’m walking along, and I tripped, and fell, and slid across the air.

???

Alan died. Something bit him, but I think it just finished him off. Don’t know how much he suffered. Buried him. He was light, even though he didn’t look thinner. Died too quick I guess.

???

Got to get to the port. Got to find a way out. I think they’re after me too.

???

It’s the pocketwatch. They know I’ve got the pocketwatch.

???

Climbed hill. Was easy, even. Bounding through the jungle. Saw bay. Port destroyed. Haven’t heard any more fighting or found anyone. How am I getting out of here? Maria. Maria.

???

Back to beach. Maybe I can build a raft. Maria.

???

Here comes a ship. They see me! Wait. They’re opening fi
[/spoiler]

Sunspace

[Le_Ministre_de_l_au-dela]

He seemed very friendly and caring and not at all like the corporate doctors I had been seeing who just wanted to write a prescription and leave the room as quickly as possible. I had been nervous but his relaxed air started to calm my doubts.

“Good morning, doctor”

“Please, call me Jim, just have a seat and tell me about why you came today.”

So I sat down and told him about the trouble I had been having sleeping. How I would just lay there with thoughts racing through my head, about how tired I was during the day, yet no matter how tired I could not grab more than a couple of hours of sleep each night. He was quiet and focused and the more I talked the easier it became to talk.

[spoiler]Finally, he broke in “Do you have any recurring dreams?”

I was taken aback, “I didn’t realize you people still asked about dreams.”

“When there are sleep problems it just seems natural to talk about dreams”

“Well, Ok, I guess, Yeah I have had one that I remember first having as a small child, it is short and kind of weird”

“Tell me about it and don’t just tell me what happens in it, tell me how you feel during it”

I took a deep breath and thought to myself “Well, this is not what I was expecting”
And then I launched in “ Well, I am in the house I grew up in, and I am around four years old. I am playing in the living room with my brother. What we are playing is not always the same but I feel tranquil and unconcerned with anything except the toys in front of me. You know how kids just get focused on stuff and get really into it. Well that’s me. My parents are off in another part of the house, when all of a sudden a giant gorilla attacks. I don’t know where it comes from or why it attacks our house, maybe I was watching Grape Ape, or King Kong before I had this dream the first time. But anyway, it grabs my father and kills him, then it grabs my mother and she is gone too. My brother and I are terrified and run out of the living room under the dining room table. I suddenly have the blanket I used to sleep with and I cover the table with it so that it is like a tablecloth that hangs down all the way to the floor. Of course in real life my blanket was just kids sized and couldn’t have come close to covering that much. Anyway, we are under the table and the blanket and are just too frightened to talk. Then we hear the gorilla come into the room. I am just hoping he can’t see us but he reaches a hand under the table and grabs my brother by the leg and drags him out. Now I am under there waiting for him to get me and I am too scared to move, but I know that any second the gorilla is going to get me, and then I wake up. It is still scary, but not like when I was a kid. Although it only happens less than once a year now, I keep thinking I will outgrow the dream but I still have it. It seems so silly for an adult to still be having dreams about blankies and gorillas.”

“Your brother is older than you, right?”

“Yeah”

“And your father is older than your mother?”

“Yeah, how did you get that from the dream?”

“Your dream is about death, a wild beast breaks into your home and steals the people you love, starting with the oldest. It is a child’s understanding of death and the realization you are going to die one day. Dreams of death are very common and can be very disturbing”

“Well it certainly is disturbing, doctor Jim , do you think it has anything to do with the insomnia?”

“It might, tell me did you have anything traumatic happen in your family as a child, maybe something violent?”

“Not that I recall, we were a normal family, my dad had a temper and sometimes yelled but he was never violent”

“How about any crimes nearby or that you witnessed”

“I can’t think of anything worse than my best friend stealing a candy bar from a 7-11 when we were 8 and his sister telling on him. Nothing I ever saw. My mother said that reason we bought our first dog, Sarah, was someone try to steal something from our house one night, but I was small and I have no memory of it. In a way I was always glad that it happened because I have loved dogs ever since.”

“Interesting, you trusted me enough to tell me about the dream so I wonder if you would trust me a little more?”

“Sure, I guess, what do you have in mind”

“Just a little guided memory, what people used to call hypnosis, but I don’t like that word because it make people think of trances, and people being commanded to do crazy things. People think that your mind is taken over but it is really the invert of that, it allows you to control your mind, to focus you mind. You see all the experiences we have are still in our brains as memories we just can’t access all of them. If you could access all of the memories at once you would be overwhelmed so the brain only lets you remember what it thinks you need. In guided memory we bypass the part of the brain that blocks memory, does that make sense?”

“I guess, yeah”

“Would you be willing to try a little guided memory.”

“Well I am here for another half hour anyways let’s try it?”

At that point he went into a drawer in his desk and pulled out a pocket watch on a chain with a little bell on the end of it. It looked like the kind of thing a time traveler would carry in a Twilight Zone episode.

This is getting weirder and weirder I thought, but I just said “A pocket watch, man you really are old fashioned”

He gave a slight chuckle “I got this many years ago from an old instructor of mine, it always works so there is no reason to change.
Now don’t be afraid, you are not going in a trance, you are just relaxing your body and focusing your mind. Look at the watch as it spins, try to only focus on the watch and the sound of my voice. Take a deep breath in and… a deep breath out. Keep your breathing slow and steady, Relax your body, focus your mind. You are going down in an elevator, each floor you go down send you into further relaxation, your mind is totally focused on the watch and my voice, your body is more relaxed than you have ever been. Now quiet all of your mind and go deep into the memory, go to the night of the break in.”

“I am there”

“How old are you?”

“I just turned four”

“Where are you?”

“I am in my bedroom, my brother is over in his bed asleep and I have just woken up”

“Tell me everything that is happening”

“I am wearing the new pajamas I got for my birthday, and I just woke up because I heard a noise in the kitchen downstairs. It is the squeaky drawer Mommy keeps all of the kitchen tools in. I want to go see her in the kitchen but I think she will just tell me to go back to bed. I will tell her I had a bad dream and she will let me sleep in the bed between her and Daddy. I am pleased with this plan and slowly and quietly go to the door so I don’t wake my brother up. If he wakes up he will want to come to and there won’t be enough room for me in the bed.

I step out in the hall, and see my mother coming up the stairs, and say softly ‘Mommy’.

Mommy stops and freezes on the top stair, and with the light from the kitchen I can
see that it is not her, it is a man. He turns his head toward me and says ‘who’s there?’ while raising his right hand.

I am frozen by fear, I don’t know this man, and I don’t know why he is in my house, I want to cry for Mommy or Daddy but nothing will come out.

He says it again, a little louder, “who’s there?”

I realize he can’t see me because of the way the light is coming from the kitchen and the long dark hallway. He takes a step toward me and I see why he raised his hand. He has a long knife raised in his hand. At the sight of the knife I let out a muffled yelp.
He says “I know your there, answer me dammit”

Just then my mother opens the door to her room and sees the stranger. She immediately lunges at him and grabs him by the shoulder.

The stranger is caught off guard and stumbles before pushing her off. She grabs his hands and they struggle in the hallway. He is bigger and stronger and he pushes he against the wall.

She yells to my dad as loud as she can, ‘Jimmy!, Jimmy get the gun!”

At this the stranger throws her down , turns and runs down the stairs.
Daddy appears at the doorway, with the gun in his hand pointing up at the ceiling and sees my mother on the ground. She says ‘I’m okay, he went downstairs’
Daddy says ‘Get the kids and bring them into our room.’
He runs downstairs and my mommy stands up. By this time my brother has come to the hall and we are holding hands.
Mommy hugs us and says “It is going to be alright, come with me”

We go into the bedroom with her and she puts us on the bed with her. I am softly sobbing and she puts her hand on my shoulder and holds me close. I feel something warm and wet on my pajamas. It is my mother’s blood, she has a cut all of the way across her palm on the hand she has placed on my shoulder. I know that this will ruin my new pajamas but I don’t care so I don’t tell her about the cut.

My father runs back into the bedroom, and says ”He is not in the house anymore, call the police and I will watch the front door til they get here.’

He goes to the big window and opens the blinds so he can look down on the front door. He is silhouetted against the light from the streetlight down the block and still has that big handgun pointing up at the ceiling.”

“And now come back, come back up the elevator, you are relaxed and your mind is alert and as you come back up the elevator your mind is fully awake.”

“Wow, Doctor, I mean James, that was something.”

“It sure was, can you come back next Tuesday at the same time?”

“Sure I can”

“Well, I think I can help you with your sleep problems, and I look forward to working with you. If you have to cancel the appointment be sure to give at least 24 hours notice and I will see you next week”

As I walked out of the office, I was still trying to get my bearings from the abrupt shift from 4 year old to adult and spent the next week trying to sort what had happened.
[/spoiler]

Puddleglum

[Le_Ministre_de_l_au-dela]

They gave me a frigging watch when I retired. It was like a joke - that’s what I thought, “You’re kidding right?” - when I saw it, like someone, one of the lads, had decided to play a joke. And this is after twenty years’ service, mind. I mean, it’s such a corporate cliche, so corny, you would never actually give someone a timepiece as a retirement gift. It’s like, I don’t know, giving a woman roses on Valentine’s Day. Or, like, a frigging train set to a kid.

You wouldn’t, would you?

Well, maybe you would. I bloody wouldn’t.

[spoiler]Why? Because it’s so obvious, such a thoughtless act that the gift itself ceases to be a manifestation of love or care or pride or affection or all the fucking things that a gift should be and just becomes a lazy arrangement of plastic or wood or wiring given not to a person, but to an identikit retiree or a cut-out celebrant. It tells you, a gift like that, that the person giving it to you has ceased to regard you as a living being of equal validity to him or her and now sees you, if they see you at all, as a cipher, an inconvenience, a thing-for-which-presents-must-be-bought. It’s an actual inverted perversion of a gift; it’s an insult, a theft, a frigging heresy.

I may sound ungrateful here. Not that I give a toss, but let me put this in context. When Daft Harry left last year, they bought him a bloody television, a great massive shiny thing. Eight years he’d been there, compared to my twenty. I’m sure you see my point. And if you don’t, great big balls to you.

So, anyway, there I was, in the lunch room at the little - very little - party they’d arranged for me. Sandwich and drink in hand, I eyeballed the thing dangling like a gilded turd from Arthur’s hand. Wrapped in a frou-frou little box, I could guess what it was even before fat Arthur - he’s the boss, the base-born maggot - called me up.

And what happened next counts as one of my most shameful moments. Even now, I cringe like a half-man, I blush hot pink, I cover myself in shame and disgrace and I hide from myself when I think of what I did when fat bastard Arthur handed that insult of an object over to me.

I took it.

And that’s bad enough, but it’s not all. I thanked the flabby whoreson, thanked him as though he and his gift were more than a turd presenting a turd, as though his gesture, insulting, dismissive, thoughtless and unimaginative as it was, was still a gratefully received light shone upon and into the void of my life. I thanked him, and I sat down, and I behaved myself for the rest of the day, stuffing food and drink down my worthless neck, waiting to leave, plotting murder and hating them, hating myself.

At home that evening, I looked at the thing, grey and lumpen in my hand. I had half-committed myself to destroying it, probably by firearm, but I thought the neighbours might worry if they saw me shooting objects on the lawn. So as I was pondering, I took it from the box and examined it more closely. It looked old, silver coloured, dusty even. “Bastards didn’t even clean it,” I thought as I dragged my thumb through the layer of dust. I had to admit, though, it was different. An original, even. It wasn’t a wristwatch, but one of the old fashioned ones designed to be strapped across the paunch, riding on the gut and preceding the arrival of the wearer like a headlamp. It dangled from a thick grey chain. A soft, grey metal, glowing dully. The watch itself, dirty as it was, shone. The face, a convex half-dome of old glass, covering an ornate pattern of crystals and cogs and two old-fashioned hands ticking unfussily around the dial, gave off a low light. As watches go, I thought, it was a good one.

But still. A fucking watch. Not a television.

A watch is a poor enough token for twenty years of a man’s life, and I was slipping into a melancholy and philosophical mood as I sat there in the gloom. I stroked the back of the watch idly, forgetfully, with the ball of my thumb. Gradually, I felt something change; a glow of heat passing from the watch, into my thumb. I noticed it slowly, then realised that it was getting hotter and hotter, to the point where I finally looked down to see whether there was something wrong with the watch. And there was, because the complex face had been replaced by a tiny whirling cosmos, something I would swear was an exact replica of our universe if I had any notion of what our universe looked like. You’ll appreciate that I was a little taken aback by this, so much so that it took me a minute to notice the strange sibilant noise growing in the room - a sort of elongated whoosh, very low at first. Even as the noise grew louder, though, my eyes were glued to that miniature universe, stars and systems moving and dancing in harmony, all in the palm of my hand. My face was reflected on the globe, I noticed, and I wondered for a moment at the sight of my features superimposed on the whole Universe. Like a God, or a Destroyer.

The noise continued to grow and I finally regained the composure to attempt an investigation. But even as I stood up, I felt my upper body pull away in the wrong direction,as though aI was being forced into a slow swirl. I fell, but didn’t strike the ground; I was dragged through the air in a clumsy flight path, the watch still dangling from my fist, the swooshing sound coming and going, louder and louder as I picked up speed. I may have screamed. I’d like to think not, though.

Scream or not, I closed my eyes. There was pressure on and in my skull, a force pressing both in and out, and I remember raising my hands to cover my face, to try to relieve some of the pressure… and it stopped. All at once, silence, stillness. I opened my eyes, and saw the watch still hanging from the hand in front of my face. Slowly, very slowly, I blinked, stepped back, looked ahead of me, at nothing, a void, then to the side and behind. I was in a room of some sort, but a room with one end open onto… nothing. Not sky, or even air, just - nothing that there’s a word for. I backed away, sweat prickling on my scalp and head spinning with vertigo, that damn watch still clenched in my hand, until I bumped up against something hard and metallic.

Now, I’m not a stupid man. Marginally panicked as I was at the complete and utter upheaval of all I thought secure and stable, I was pretty quick to realise what was going on, especially when I turned around to see what looked like a primitive computer console. Time travel, I thought, and I impulsively reached over and pressed the biggest key on the console. The screen came alive, showing rows of numbers: 0000. Obviously, the controller for the travel; as in every movie ever made about this stuff, you simply type in the date you want to hit.

I don’t know if you’ve ever found yourself in this position, but I expect not. You can imagine, I daresay, that the first reaction is confusion and resistance; you want to go home. But if you’re any sort of a person, any sort of a man, you’ll overcome that thought and start to appreciate the wonder of what is before you quickly. And, of course, I did. I admit to that first craven thought, the desire for my own home in my own time, but then my mind seized on the things I could see and feel, the things I could do. The things I could fix.

My mind swam. How far to go? How many chances would I have? What to bring? The great wars? Revolutionary or Renaissance times? Medieval Europe? Greece in its heyday, 500 years before Christ? Christ, for that matter - could I see him preach? Kill Hitler? Oswald? I saw a well, a depository, and I realised immediately that the watch would fit perfectly; so, I had to give up the watch, and that meant I had one chance, one go. I stood, hand poised over that clumsy old keyboard, frozen, unmanned by too much choice.

But, come the time, come the man, and after a little while my mind cleared and I realised that one date, one event needed my attention more than any other. As I thought of it, it suddenly seemed obvious and I nodded grimly as I tapped the date - day and month and year, for it was burned in my memory - and there is a feeling that fills a man like blood when he feels destiny envelop him. Few people get a chance to intervene in the way I was about to; few people are capable of taking the opportunity when it arises. I typed the number, braced myself, then hit ‘Enter.’ Immediately, my new world receded away from me and again I felt the pressure on my skull, the pain that grew until it was just this side of bearable, and again I threw my hands up, again I covered my eyes and felt myself spin, faster, faster…

‘Are you okay?’ A hand on my shoulder. I opened my eyes, looked at the crowd of people facing me. ‘Do you need a drink?’ That voice, so familiar to me, the cold tones of evil. I steeled myself and turned, ready to do what needed to be done. Turning, I felt the hand fall from my shoulder and then I was face to face with Fat Arthur. In his hand, he held the box with the watch in it. On his face, he wore a smile that looked like grey gravestones being forced between two sacks of liver. He was looking at me with mock concern - I probably did look quite odd - but obviously he simply wanted to get the charade over and done with so he could get back to boozing and groping interns. He leaned over to me and whispered, his foul breath like a wet kiss from a drunk monkey, ‘Are you all right? Shall we get this over with?’ and I nodded, silenced once again by sheer hatred.

As he made his speech, short and dull, I did not know what I was going to do. Would that terrible passivity, that weakness rob me of action again? But, when he turned to me with his hand outstretched, that box, that watch inside it, I knew exactly. I took a few slow steps backwards, then bounced on my toes. As he looked at me, I gave three little hops, I and then, as he started to say, ‘What are you…’ I took three elegant steps forward, as though I was stating a high jump run-up. Fat Arthur started to move back, but as I took my third long, balletic step, I swung my foot forward and allowed my pointed brogue to connect firmly, softly, snugly with his balls. I felt his groin move in with my foot, watched his face melt into a puddle of surprise and then,slowly, pain. He collapsed, imploded, almost, in on himself and hit the floor.

‘A watch?’ I said aloud, turning to make sure all the rotten bastards in the the audience heard me. ‘Stick it up your arse.’
And I turned and walked out, head held high. Magnificent.
[/spoiler]

The Mighty Boosh

[Le_Ministre_de_l_au-dela]

It was Labor Day and I was glad to have the day off with just my wife Ellen and our two kids for a change. No picnics or barbecues, just a day off to spend however we wanted. My family is used to the odd or late hours I work (as I don’t work a corporate gig). They’re also used to my penchant for not observing what I call “secondary holidays.” Besides Easter, Thanksgiving and Christmas (The Big Three), everything else is up for grabs; sometimes not even then. This last especially seems to irk my father-in-law: A died-in-the-wool, down-home, bible-thumpin’ Southern Baptist preacher. I figured at the least you could say I’m “religious” when it comes to the holidays.

Rimshot from heaven, praise Jesus!

[spoiler]Plans, schedules, lists, calendars, crowded shopping malls filled with people dithering over what completely unnecessary gift to buy someone who’ll forget about it within a week anyway. All forced sentiments wrought with family drama; as for me, bah humbug. Going to and fro, and seeing just about everybody I know and those whom I can barely remember their faces, let alone their names, requires a social energy I think God or whomever turned that last quirky screw into the clockwork of the universe just didn’t wire me for. And hell, I used to be an atheist before all this—now I’m not so certain (nor am I so certain He’s all that benevolent as pastor Terry Janes likes to drill into everybody’s head). Just give me some quiet time or dirt to till, and everything seems just right with the world.

Mentioning “clockwork” seems apropos, as it’s exactly why I’m bothering to even put this down on paper (since the computer doesn’t work like it should anymore). Ellen has always felt I’m best at organizing my thoughts when I write them down. Like weeding the yard seams to relieve my stress, she felt writing is akin to weeding my thoughts. I do concede I have a hard time with expressing what I’m going through when I happen to use that all-too-convenient toothy hole in my head that’s unfortunately connected directly to the swirling diarrhea in my brain (as it seems to lack a filter). Besides the fact there’s no one to talk to, say that watch does wind down someday; this’ll remain long after I’m gone.

So it was weeding, ironically, which brought me to that rusty time capsule containing that goddamn watch.

• • •

The soil was bone dry by early September. It’s was hard to keep on top of the yard work as this year was too busy with work and familial obligations. I meant to simply dig out most of the weeds and just “sweat out my demons” as Ellen liked to call it; the ones that seem to build up in the blood when you’ve been working in your job too long without a break.

Weedin’ the demons! Glory to Gawd!

Some of those weeds became the size of poplars—their roots that much deeper. It looked daunting, but I started this project the only way I knew how: Willy nilly.

The first three or four weeds-gone-trees had given me far more struggle than I’d hoped for. It times like these that reminds me I’m not getting any younger, or getting much exercise.

Exercisin’ the demons! Hallelujah!

I got to the fifth overgrown brush, and used the shovel to perforate a crude circle around its roots. By this time, it was easily noon-thirty; I was full of crusty dirt, sweating like a pig, guzzling gallons of water which never seemed to slake, and I was loving every minute of it. As I put the weight of my Carhartt boot on the top of the shovel, I could feel the last of the thick spidery roots crunch, sever, then finally give way. I pulled with everything I had thinking this one would be as stubborn as the others, but it just came right out of the ground and sent me flailing backwards on my ass, right into the spade of the dirty shovel. The bloated, radish-shaped clog of mud clinging to the root system crumbled as it hit the ground. The tip of the shovel had found its way into my crotch, just behind my balls, threatening to castrate them if I made the wrong move.

Slain in the taint, Glory be!

I rose, gingerly. Grabbing the shovel in one hand as I checked on the family jewels. Still all there, although there was a bit of blood when I looked at my fingers. I’ll have to remember to wipe carefully.

I sheepishly threw the shovel like a javelin into the dirt-impacted roots and heard a metallic tink. It hit something inside. The only thing I like more than working with my hands, is a curious distraction. I pulled the shovel out like it was Excalibur and I, now the future King Arthur, bent down to investigate; the hole in the crotch of my pants split open like a crack in the earth. If anyone could see, I didn’t care. I used the shovel to hack away at the dirt. Immediately a rusted shut tin box came tumbling out.

This farm house was built maybe twenty years after the Civil War. We were on a good few acres of Ohio property, so God only knows how long that thing had been buried. The tin was eroded from at least a hundred summers of rain, and just as many winters of frozen soil, I would be surprised if anything inside it was intact. The dirt and rust on the outside certainly wasn’t a good indication. It appeared to be an old tobacco tin, but most of the paint was too far gone to tell. Nonetheless, things rattled inside. The area just behind my balls started to sting from my little mishap. I thought better to disinfect first, before I pried the circular lid off this bacteria-ridden tin.

• • •

My two boys were in the family room playing some side-scrolling game on the Xbox, and already talking smack at the ages of eleven and nine. I called for Ellen over the din of the video game and the boy’s Tourette’s-like rambling, as I pulled off my dirty boots, holding tightly to the tin.

She immediately laughed out loud when she saw my trousers, despite the blood. The kids were too engrossed in their game to even notice. I showed her the treasure I found within the weed that was clutching it like a witches gnarled hand, but she was still wiping the tears from here eyes, and seemed more interested in mending the gash right between where the Good Lord split me and hit me. We went into the bathroom, where I could strip off my pants and boxers. I took the tin with me if anything but to keep me occupied while Ellen did the “dirty work.” It was a pretty good gash, anything deeper and a trip to the ER would’ve been in order. As she was cleaning the wound, I gave the lid a good twist, but it didn’t give. Ellen was chiding me for not standing still, but I was determined. This thing seemed resistant to giving up its secrets. I believe I know why, now. The clockwork was already in gear, and I was gumming up the works. Ellen had put some Vaseline out, so I applied a bit around the rusted shut screw-cap. I thought to invert the tin, banging its top on the counter, then giving it some good torque. Reluctantly, it give a raspy croak, and POP! the lid just tore right off. I peered inside, and saw only one object and a piece of ancient paper. I dumped the contents next to the sink.

“Ellen, look at this!”

“Would you stop so I can finish? It’s not exactly sunshine back here.”

“It’s a watch.”

She stopped at that, and came around from my back side. *Why would anyone want to bury this? *I’d thought, it was exquisite. It was hanging on a fob, and smacked of something Egyptian, but was at least Victorian; I was sure of it. You could see its tiny gears, behind the roman numerals, meticulously turning. I marveled at this. How could it still be working? The patina on its silvery surface spoke its age.

“That’s impossible.” The first thing Ellen said when she laid eyes on it. “Did you just wind that?”

“No. It came right out of the tin like this.”

“C’mon, John. How long has that been in there?”

“I’d be surprised if it was any less than a hundred years.”

“No way.”

I shrugged, eyebrows raised. As I was turning the watch around in my hands, she picked up the piece of eroded paper. I could see her behind me in the mirror, squinting at the old, smeared handwriting. There was a knob at the top of the watch, encrusted with a blue gem. It was the dial to wind it, but it was also sticking out like an unpressed button. With my thumb, I depressed it on a whim. The blue gem at the top turned obsidian. The watch stopped. I turned to show Ellen, but she was just staring at the paper.

“Check this out,” I said.

No response. She was just staring. Holding still. Frozen. I tried to shake her, but she would barely move. Her hair as stiff as if she had used a whole can of Aqua Net.

“Honey?” My blood chilled over. I yanked up my boxers, and ran into the family room. What my eyes saw, sent freon up my spine. There, my kids were frozen as well. The video game seemed paused. The fish in the fish bowl seemingly locked in ice. I dipped my finger into the water, but it was like pushing into jello. Even moving through the air seemed to have far more drag. I ran back into the bathroom and took my original stance, and clicked the knob again. The gem regained its eerie blue. The watch ticked into gear and Ellen resumed trying to decipher the paper.

“It’s totally illegible.” She said. She was right, although now I think I know what it may have said.

“Why do you look so pale? The pain spreading to your balls now?” She smiled.

• • •

I’d used the watch time and time again over the years. Any time I needed some quiet in this ever increasing chaotic world. Yet, like a watch that’s running too fast, I kept aging while time was frozen, slowly falling out of sync with the rest of the world. How many days, months—years even—had I given up for solitude? It was a drug. An aberration against nature. I knew my time was running out lest I age decades faster than everyone else.

The last I saw Ellen and the kids must be a decade now. It’s hard to say when there’s not a clock that works; locked in indefinite sunshine. I’d rarely go to her father’s church on Sundays, so I had asked her a favor: I told her it was a time capsule of my own. What the aluminum lockbox contained I didn’t say, but I left my own cautionary note inside. I asked her to take it somewhere far, where I’d never find it, and bury it there. She was horribly bemused, but obliged. I can only guess that the knob must’ve been activated while it was jostled into the hole she was burying it in. As to where, well I pray one day I’ll find out, although the church is thirty miles from here; and in God’s country there’s a lot of territory to comb. I ache to see them again, and soon, as my hair is already thinning and going grey.

Goddamn. Can I get an ‘Amen’?[/spoiler]

cmyk

[Le_Ministre_de_l_au-dela]

It looks like a temporary mausoleum, I thought as I reached out to touch the dark weathered stones that were not interrupted by even a single window. I’d never been there before, but I knew it wasn’t a temporary anything: this building had stood on the outskirts of our village for hundreds of years. No one remembered who had built it, but we all knew why.

Glancing back over my shoulder, I could just barely see the coffin I’d begged be dragged up here. It couldn’t, wouldn’t, work if the dead wasn’t near. The dead. My brain tried to skitter away from the thought of Jesse being dead, but I knew he was there in that box, waiting for me to rescue him.

[spoiler]No one could understand why I was willing to enter the House of Regret… they didn’t know my crushing guilt. If he hadn’t snuck out after dark to see me, he wouldn’t be dead.

There hadn’t been a clear cause of death. Instead his body had been found inverted in the crotch of a tree, alabaster pale, and limp like the discarded dolls still littering the back of my closet. Of course, there were suspicions about what had killed him, and that’s why I was standing in front of an iron ring, trying to will my fingers to grasp it and open the door.

The villagers wanted to burn his body as a precaution against the evils their overheated minds conjured up, but he’d told me twice over the past few years that he would rather be wormfood than given a cradle of ash. I couldn’t let that happen, so I told people I’d come here and bring him back. Everyone said “Elizabeth don’t” but how could I listen to them when Jesse had been so fearful of flames?

People visited the House of Regret only once or twice a generation, and my mother swore that no one had since her grandparents were children. This was meant to be a seed of doubt, a worry that the magic wouldn’t work any more, but I owed him. She couldn’t understand that, none of them could, but I owed him.

Enough delay. I pulled the door open and it moved with a hideous groan. There were no lights of course. Never had been. None were needed. Once I stepped over the threshold, I pulled the door closed behind me and mourned the passing of daylight as it shrank down to a thin line, then disappeared.

I stood there waiting, shivering in the damp. It would have been pointless to worry about what sort of things might have been in there with me, those that skittered or crawled, because what I’d see when I could see again would be far far worse. Be brave, I counseled myself. Once I get through and reach the clock, I can turn it all back.

That was the point: face your fear and you gain the power to turn back time; not all the way, just a little, just enough. Or so the theory went. Everyone claimed to know someone who had tried it, and more someones who had failed. But they could never back their claims and give them a face, an actual body to ask questions of. It hardly seemed possible given that so many people knew I’d come here, but maybe Mom’s insistence was true and no one had been there for ages.

“What do you regret the most?”

I whipped my head around, looking for the source, but that was ridiculous. There was nothing to see. And I knew, knew, that the voice hadn’t come out of a throat.

Did I say it aloud, or did I just think it? I wondered, wishing that I’d asked someone that before walking up here. Maybe I didn’t even have to think about it I decided as the room began to lose some of its dampness.

Several yards away a pinprick of light began to grow, and I wrapped my arms around myself. When the confusion of lights and images before me began to corporate into a familiar scene, I had to fight a keening that desperately wanted to be voiced. Somehow, when I thought about regrets in the days since Jesse had been found, this wasn’t what had come to mind. But it should have.

Our schoolyard. The school had held only the fifteen of us because the hard years during our earliest childhoods had stolen many of our siblings from their cribs, if families had dared to have babies at all. Once there had been two teachers, teaching in separate classrooms, but now there was one and the other room was boarded to reduce heating costs.

While I watched, little Betsy came into view, trailing Jesse and Aaron. I’d been eight, Jesse ten, and Aaron was a great big boy of fifteen. Aaron had once been the oldest of four but was now an only child, which is why he tolerated the little kids’ hero-worship. Older than him now, I realized that he missed his siblings, but hadn’t then. Not that awful then.

We’d had pails in our hands, and had been charged with picking berries for snack time. The teacher trusted Aaron to keep an eye on us, and he took this duty fairly seriously. But then he had to pee.

“I’ve uh, gotta go,” he’d told us, cheeks warm. “Stay here, okay? I’ll be right back.”

“Okay.”

For a moment we’d watched in interest as he searched for a tree to duck behind, but we soon lost interest. Instead Jesse pointed at a tree. “Look at that.”

“What about it?” I’d asked, distracted by the thought that life would be easier if I could pee outside too.

“We should climb it.”

“Aaron said to stay here,” I reminded Jesse.

“And we wouldn’t be going anywhere,” he insisted. “The tree is right here.”

This seemed logical enough, so I began to follow him as he climbed the low branches. “Not so fast,” I complained, my dress slowing me down. Life would also be easier in trousers, I decided fiercely. Boys had all the luck.

Jesse ignored me, and I struggled to keep up. I was so focused on not being left behind that I was hardly aware that we’d climbed so high. But when a branch snagged my dress and unbalanced me, I was made aware of it.

The ground met me with a rattling thump and I screamed. Jesse was so startled that he almost fell out right after me, but managed not to somehow.

Aaron must have heard my yell because he came running, his trousers still halfway unbuttoned. He blamed Jesse, not me, but I protested saying that he hadn’t forced me to climb the tree.

When they tried to get me to stand, I couldn’t. So Aaron picked me up and carried me back, yelling at Jesse the whole way.

I expected there to be trouble when we reached the schoolyard, but not the way it happened. Our teacher looked at Aaron carrying me, and at his flapping trousers, and whispered to one of the big girls who took of running. I didn’t know then, but she’d sent the girl for the sheriff.

When the sheriff came, he took Aaron aside and spoke sharply to him. From where I’d been set to wait for the doctor, all I could see was the sheriff’s angry face, and Aaron shaking his head. Jesse had gotten close enough to hear and I grabbed his hand when he walked by me. “What’s going on?”

Jesse’s face turned red. Whispering, he said, “Teacher and him think that Aaron did… something… to you.”

“Did something?” I repeated, uncertain.

“You know,” Jesse mumbled.

I didn’t, so I shrugged. “Tell him Aaron didn’t.”

“Can’t.”

“Why??”

“Aaron’s in trouble, not us. We tell the sheriff what happened, we’ll get into trouble too. This is better.”

“No it’s not,” I insisted.

Jesse pinched me. “Yes, it is.”

As much as I liked Aaron, I liked Jesse more, so I held my tongue and that might be why we’d grown up as thick as thieves and had become more once we were grown. Neither of us said anything. Even when the sheriff led Aaron away just after Doc Addams arrived to set my broken leg. Even when Aaron and his parents were driven from the village. Even when villagers set their empty house on fire so they daren’t move back.

The last image before me was one of people bathed in firelight, shouting as they threw burning brands through that house’s windows.

I moaned as the scene faded into nothing, leaving me in the chilled damp again. “Now what?” I asked the dark.

“Amends.”

Amends? I didn’t even know where to start. It had been nearly a decade since I’d last seen any member of Aaron’s family. “I will,” I promised aloud, though inside I doubted I would succeed. How could I?

My promise must have been sincere enough because once again the darkness was incomplete. Bracing myself, I looked, worried to see another memory given form, but that’s not what I saw at all.

The new light was a cool green in an improbable clearing, and there was a single sapling planted there. From one of its spindly branches hung the prized: a small clock suspended from a chain. While beautiful in its own way, it hardly seemed any more special than any of the clocks bartered in neighboring villages.

I ran towards it, scared that the light would fade before I reached it, but it didn’t. My fingers trembled as I reached for the clock, and I half expected for my hand to close upon nothing, but it was a chilly solid weight in my palm.

“Ring the bell once for each day,” I whispered to myself.

Four thin peals later, I let the clock go, watching it swing for a moment.

And then I felt a force at my back, pushing me out. I tried to dig in my heels, hoping I’d see a sign that it had worked before I was expelled, but resistance was futile. I was nearly flung out of the building, and found myself stumbling outside, trying hard not to fall.

To my amazement, it was night. Inside I’d lost all sense of time. Hours must have passed.

When I heard branches snap, I froze. The logical conclusion was that it was someone from the village had come to see what had become of me, but that didn’t necessarily mean I’d see a friendly face. Many people muttered about how we should tear this place down because it was unnatural, and somehow I was sure that they visited it more often than people who held it in reverence.

Moonlight filtered out most colors, but the person I saw was familiar enough. The night bleached him pale, but his dark curls and dancing eyes were the same.

“Jesse?” I squeaked.

“Have you seen Aaron?” he asked.

“Aaron?” Maybe this place had brought Aaron so I could apologize. We both could, now.

“He came to see me a few days ago,” Jesse continued. “We talked about the past. He wants to see you too.”

“Oh. I need to speak to him, and I will,” I promised. “Jesse, I thought you were dead!” Such a stupid comment. It had worked. I’d brought him back.

“Oh, Elizabeth,” he murmured, gathering me in his cool arms just before twin dots of fire burned my neck. “I am.”
[/spoiler]

Elfkin477

[Le_Ministre_de_l_au-dela]

And there - the poll is established, and the voting may begin at any time. I’d also like to open the floor to anyone wishing to comment on the stories - constructive criticism from the readers is one of the most valuable things about these contests.

What an interesting range of ideas from those words and that picture! Good work, everyone!

[Sunspace]

Cool! We can now [del]slag the other authors and their works[/del] give enlightened and constructive criticism on the stories!

I’m excusing myself from the voting on the grounds that I wrote one of the stories. I’ll have to reread the other stories and think a bit to make comments.

[cmyk]

Thanks, Le Min!

[Le_Ministre_de_l_au-dela]

@Sunspace

I’m excusing myself from the voting on the grounds that I wrote one of the stories.

Oh, actually, I’m glad you brought that up. Please, don’t excuse yourself from voting - we need all the people we can get to step up and voice their opinion. The greatest number of voters we’ve ever had was 23 for the very first one; we had only 11 voters in June of 2011. Especially as there is no need to choose only one story, by all means, vote for whichever stories you feel are your favourites.

And if you honestly feel that includes the story you yourself wrote, then vote for it with a clear conscience.

Seriously, we need as many people as possible to vote.