TOUGH LIT. II by Laurie Notch

Special Issue

February – March 2011

Back by popular demand… Our special series devoted to MORE Crime Mystery Suspense Prison Grit WARNING: Some stories deal with strong themes using strong language. Not for the weak of heart… or bladder. PRICE: $8.50

FEATURED AUTHOR – DOV SILVERMAN Dov (Robert) Silverman is the ninth generation on his mother’s side born in Brooklyn, New York. After 3 years as a US Marine in the Korean War, he worked as a Long Island Railroad conductor, an auctioneer, and he established Autar Microfilm Service. While working nights on the Railroad and studying full-time days, he earned his high school diploma and went on to graduate from Stony Brook University, Long Island, New York, cum laude, at the age of 39. Dov Silverman is the author of the FALL OF THE SHOGUN five-book historical series that appeared on the London Times Best-Seller List and was also published in German, Polish and Hebrew. He won a 1988 Suntory Mystery Fiction Award in Japan for REVENGE OF THE GOOD SHEPHERDS; was Writer-in-Residence at Christian Brothers University, Memphis, Tennessee, USA, 1995 school year; was a teacher at Writer’s Digest Magazine Correspondence School, 1994-1997. Dov is presently completing THE PROPHET AND THE PRIEST, based on a story he learned from his students in Safed whose families emigrated as a group from Italy to Israel with the help of an Italian Priest and the Prophetic visions of Donato Manduzio. Dov is also writing an autobiographical novel. To place an order for an autographed copy of Dov Silverman’s books, feel free to write him:

States. Los Angeles boasted 11,000 inhabitants and San Diego 2,650. The population growth of these and all cities in the southwest today is directly attributed to Frank Crowe, the man who made the desert bloom. Truth is more than a summary of facts. It must include a response of the soul to those facts. "The Dam Builder" is faction; a historically accurate, emotional response to the construction of the Hoover Dam and to the Great Depression. This novel focuses on Frank Crowe's personality, his drive, and his innovative construction techniques that brought about the changes. Frank Crowe and the times he lived in are seen through Frank’s eyes, through his wife Linnie’s eyes and a representative selection of people who came to build the Hoover Dam in Devil's Canyon. All those remarkable people helped lead America and the world out of the Great Depression.

CChheecckk oouutt tthheessee aanndd ootthheerr bbooookkss bbyy DDoovv SSiillvveerrm maann::

Dov Silverman 130/B Ahuza Street Apt. 5 Ra'anana, 43300 ISRAEL THE KABBALIST is an exciting story that presents a thought provoking mystery with international, religious intrigue throughout, especially as the plot approaches its bizarre climax. Via 16th-entury Kabbalah and present-day Safed, questions that pre-occupy everyone are raised: good and evil; reward and punishment; life after. The main character, a 20th century rabbi named Berel Caspi, who must overcome extreme grief at the death of his only son and his son's fiancée, summons his Talmudic powers to face Satan in the Holy City of Safed. The rabbi awakes a Kabbalistic Saint from his grave in order to combat Satan on the mountaintop in Galilee. This is indeed a fascinating, spell-binding story that captures the imagination. The story ignites with Satan's powerful control. Ripping asunder the fundamental ties of three rabbis from their convictions and traditions, it shows the viewer just what a formidable enemy Satan is. THE DAM BUILDER In 1882, a child was born on a small farm near Quebec, Canada. Frank Crowe grew to be the man destined to change the demographics of America and the landscape of the world. In 1882, Salt Lake City, Utah, with less than 20,000 people, was the most populated city in southwestern United 2

THE DAM BUILDER BY DOV SILVERMAN

TOUGH LIT. II

A Allll aavvaaiillaabbllee oonn A Am maazzoonn..ccoom m!!

AFTAW SPECIAL

Inside this Issue

For the past 5 years, Adventures for the Average Woman has been a stepping stone for writers on the arduous climb up the steep path to publication. It has been our honor and privilege to be the first opportunity for many writers to get their start as well as to help promote the books of up-and-coming writers. Although we are but a small piece in the publishing puzzle, we have contributed to the careers of dozens of writers to date. Weâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re always looking for stories, articles, poetry, and artwork for upcoming issues. So send us your submissions now and get published very soon! (For guidelines, go to www.IdeaGems.com.) OUR STAFF

Laurie E. Notch, Managing Editor In charge of stories, articles, poems To contact, email: ideagems@aol.com

Elizabeth Wyrwicz, Graphic Artist and Layout Editor In charge of art, photography, and graphics To contact, email: glowcatstudio@gmail.com

Mary Regan, Public Relations In charge of advertising and promotions To contact, email: meregan4@gmail.com Lauren Chisholm, Assistant Editor In charge of editing print submissions To contact, email: cellogirl42@gmail.com

VOL 6, ISSUE 2

Book Look

The Nature of Murder, The Murder of Nature

The Babysitter

Love Kills

Grey Goose

Poetry from Prison

Locked Up

I Keep Holding On

Little Boxes

Painting the Parlor

Heirs of Justice, Pt 2

Journey of a Victim

Cold Hard Steel

The Unwanted Visitor

When Love Dies

Officer Friendly

Mariel

Death by Foreplay

The Eternal Nocturne, Pt 2

Literary Symbiosis

Party Time!

The Underground Connection

Farewell

The Love of Your Life

First Date

From Us to Youâ&#x20AC;Ś We are proud to bring you this second in a series of SPECIAL ISSUES devoted to true crime, crime drama, political suspense, stories from prison, edgy literature, with a couple of nice poems tossed in to soften this brassy mix. Every day we receive more and more submissions from talented writers and artists striking out on their grand adventure of getting published. We offer many of them their first chance. To do this, we continually need your support through the purchase of our literary product and passing the good word for others to do the same. Our regular quarterly publication will, of course, continue with special issues on specific themes in between. If you have a story, poem, photography or artwork to contribute, please submit it to: ideagems@aol.com. As always, thanks for reading! -- Laurie Notch, Managing Editor WWW.IDEAGEMS.COM

The Nature of Murder, The Murder of Nature by Michael James Marino

They’ll never catch me. They will never know it was me. They will never find out how I knew him, why I hated him, or how I killed him. They won’t know if it was revenge or spontaneous death. They won’t be able to tell if he died of natural causes or some other foul method. They will never even be close to solving this one. No seasoned cop could crack this one, not the best detective or the cast from Law and Order. Forensic Files would give up and decide this one is too tough to touch. Of course this is how I planned it; I believe it is well planned. And as for the guilt, it will never get to me, for I live every day in hiding, every moment in cloaked obscurity. I am a motion in the shadows, not to be believed or acknowledged, just existing under everyone’s notice. And as I pull his corpse up to my nose and inhale his freshly dismembered body all I feel is pleasure and smiles, the way nature intended… Everyday I would pass him. On my way out of the house, he would be there. He would sit silent in the morning when I left, in the evening when I came home. He waited like he knew my schedule and made it his own agenda. He would model just staring into me. As if he was looking deeper into my soul for an inner inspection of some kind. He was analyzing me, under careful eye and microscope. He was belligerent, consistent, and intense with his stare. He made me sick to my stomach. I could just vomit on his face, dead or alive. As my neighbor he became my enemy. Not just with his cold and bold stares but also with his very existence. There was no reason for him to live so close to me, for that matter there was no reason for him to live at all. That was part of the reason I killed him. He was there, he was an easy target, and he just didn’t need to be around any longer. That and I couldn’t wait to admire his corpse in my dining room. Some individuals are passive; they can exist so close yet so unnoticed to everyone. I am one like that. I don’t bother anybody. I keep to myself. I am a good neighbor, I never make eye contact. That wretch I snuffed was not quite any of these. He would always be present, seemingly highlighted in pastel colors. He would always be armed with a glance or a stare that was intended only to tell you how much better he had it. His stare would chant that he was better than you. He made less money and yet he was happier. Friends and family were always popping up; he was never at a lack for company. Me, I am a loner. I don’t need anyone else to be happy. I am happy. I have his body severed and trimmed on my kitchen counter. How could I not be happy now? Some say to kill or dismember is evil, against the laws of nature. I say to cease to be beautiful and breathe are the laws of nature. It happens to all of us by someone’s hand. Whether that hand is yours, mine, or God’s you will feel its touch. I sure felt like God as I ripped his flesh from its structure. I used delicate precision with measured tugs that gently separated his parts. He was dead with the first injury, there were elixirs that could have sustained him for week or so, but he would not drink that medicine yet. I watched as he died within my hands. He didn’t scream. He didn’t bleed. He only let out a soft “snap” as he died. The snap was followed by a mild odor. It was pleasant the way little girls like. It sure smelled natural to me. I sit in my glory, having killed my enemy. Smiling and placing his corpse in a pose that I feel fits my liking, not the way he looked when alive. I am at peace when I hear the knock on my door. “Who’s there?” I sweat instantly. “Katie!” yelled the twenty year old behind the door. Wretched beauty I adore. She is the light in my path, the tone in my song. Without her I would get by, just not as happy. She is my other neighbor. Some might call her a friend; some might say she is my crush. I like to believe we are linked like a chain. A strong chain and I am just waiting for her to come around to me so we can complete the loop. I glance down at the fresh corpse before me and I panic. Where am I going to hide him now, he’s soaking wet. I just cleaned his upper half and

fed the lower down the garbage disposal to be ground into the sewer. My sweating surely will give me away. I must calm down. I will see how she reacts upon seeing his corpse. If she ever so slightly looks askew then I must kill her as well. She will be a tough kill, me loving her and all. But I am not going to any prison but my own for violating the laws of nature. Laws I do not even acknowledge. “Coming!” I chirp. I must act as if nothing odd has happened. I must be coy and play down the crime. I will act as if I kill in this manner every day. I take one last deep breath as I reach for the door knob and give it that heavy sweaty turn. “Katie! What a surprise. Come on in.” I seemed inviting right? “I was on my way to the market and wanted to see if you needed anythi…” Her voice trailed as her eyes settled on the crime scene besides my sink. Her lips were silent but her jaw was loud and dropped open, her eyes glazing over the various pieces of his body, all neatly arranged and laid out like a parade along my counter. I separated the soft parts and the toxic offenders, the ones that could draw blood out of a man’s finger. Some of his limbs were stacked off to the side. I see she was eyeing the cleaned up torso of his corpse, the piece I planned to display. The piece that I admired, the piece that was for my eyes, my nose, and maybe even if the beauty struck me, my lips. For I knew eating his flesh would not kill me, it wouldn’t even cause bad breath. Her mouth was slowly closing in to make its next words. I was scared and anxious. I began to search for her murder weapon among the kitchen. As I eyed the chef’s knife she spoke. My heart sank and my smile grew as her words escaped. “Did you do this, Willy?” she wasn’t accusing me, she was smiling grandly and manically. She was on my side. “For you…” I mumbled “So sweet. Whatever made you think of me?” “I’m always thinking of you.” I released my stare on the chef’s knife. She wasn’t freaked out or disappointed in me. She was inhaling the drippings of his flesh, the natural juices his body emitted. She was overwhelmed by his death, so much more beauty dead than alive. He was crippled and silent in her hands, a scene too beautiful to film or discuss. The look of morbid satisfaction was clear and gleaming across her face. I knew this came from her hatred of his stares as well. Katie would often come to visit me, surely she had seen him staring and mocking the way he does towards me. Perhaps he had been even crueler to her. Now she had the last laugh. She got the last stare at him, he was unable to blink or change, he was without limb or base. His face groomed and pinched in the perfect pose. And it was all for her. She knew it. I killed because I loved her, and that is usually the way nature works.

Michael James Marino is fiction writer and journalist residing in Southwest Florida. Originally from Miami, he migrated to pursue an English degree at Florida Gulf Coast University. While at FGCU he served as Staff Writer, Campus News Editor, and Front Page News Editor for the university's newspaper, The Eagle News. His work has also appeared in the 2009 edition of Edison State College's literary journal, Illuminations. He has studied under the likes of Maria Cahill and Rebecca Totaro. He is a father of two and is currently working on a full length novel. He can be followed on Twitter: http://twitter.com/AmazingMrMikey

TOUGH LIT. II

AFTAW SPECIAL

The Babysitter

by Bill Finnegan

Within the darkened opera house Act II of Madam Butterfly was drawing to a close. Cho-Cho-San and her little boy knelt inside her small hilltop house looking down at the harbor where Lieutenant Pinkerton’s ship was moored. He had been gone for three years, and Cho-Cho San had almost given up hope he would return and see the son she had borne him. A DramaScent system surrounded the audience with the aroma of the sea and of the celebratory flowers adorning the little bamboo house. From the ceiling and four corners of the opera house, courtesy of its innovative Acoustiwrap design, came the unprocessed sound of a chorus of sopranos and tenors humming a tender melody that gave no hint of the tragedy that was to follow. As she sat in the audience Clare was aware something was bothering her, but she could not put her finger on it. The opera tickets had been expensive so being distracted by a vague uneasiness was extremely irritating. She quickly went over the events of the day hoping to pinpoint the source of her concern. * * * At breakfast she and her husband noticed that their nannydroid, Monique, had developed a stutter. Fearing this foreshadowed a systems crash, Clare took Monique to the maintenance department of the dealership where she purchased her. “She’s going to be babysitting for our three-year old twin boys tonight so I need to be sure she’s okay,” she told the technician behind the counter. “I’ve started stuttering,” Monique added helpfully, “and we wawant to be su-sure my CPU won’t lock up.” “I’m afraid we can’t look at her today, but you can leave her and we’ll let you have Bob, a loaner, who’d be a perfect babysitter,” the technician said. “Used to take care of the puppies and kittens waiting for adoption at the Hinesville animal shelter before it closed. A local nursery school has used him dozens of times, and they say he really loves small kids. Very gentle and protective, and he charms them with cute stories about the animals he cared for. He’s only five years old, has a 72-hour battery, and an impressive 140 AIQ, so he’s a lot smarter than Monique. Was a jack-of-all-trades at the shelter, they say. And if after trying him you like him enough to buy him, we’d let you have him for twenty percent below blue book.” Clare knew manufacturers were notorious for inflating artificial intelligence quotas and dealerships routinely hinted their droids possessed that holy grail of AI research, empathy. This was dangerous because it gave buyers a false sense of security. As it was, the latest household droids had such pleasant voices and attractive virtual personalities it was easy to forget they had no compassion and morality to fall back on in situations not anticipated by software designers. However, they all were programmed to reject commands that used so-called “words of harm” and this had proved to be extremely effective. So Clare’s only concern was to make sure that Bob knew enough about caring for children, and she painstakingly questioned him about this for half an hour, giving special attention to how he would react in various emergency scenarios. She asked, for example, “What would you do, Bob, if one of the boys got food stuck in his windpipe?” “I have been programmed to deal with that, Madam. At the shelter I would watch the children for signs of distress when they ate the candy I gave them. If the child can make sounds and cough loudly I know the airway blockage is mild and can let him or her cough up the

VOL 6, ISSUE 2

food. Otherwise I need to act quickly and perform the Heimlich maneuver on children over one-year of age or administer back slaps and two-finger chest thrusts to infants. Of course, the amount of force I use has to be commensurate with the child’s size. ” Though the interview left her satisfied with Bob’s qualifications, Clare found his appearance to be very off-putting. Like Monique, he was a chrome-plated semi-android. But while Monique’s limbs and movements were human-like, Bob had very long arms, moved about like a giant chimpanzee, and had his sensory nodes and speaker grill configured to give him a grinning chimp-like affair for a face. The motif had presumably been chosen to charm children visiting the animal shelter, although a primatologist would consider it odd because chimpanzees in the wild were a violent species in which males commonly killed infants so the mothers would mate. But Clare knew that her boys, who were very fond of stories about Curious George the monkey, would love Bob at first sight, and really that was all the mattered. * * * On stage the touching vigil of mother and child continued. Subtle changes in lighting and music signaled the passage of time. The moon was now up, and Cho-Cho-San’s little boy suddenly slumped against her as he fell asleep. At that moment Clare recalled the conversation between her husband and Bob just before they left for the opera. “The boys are a challenge at bed time. They’ll want you to play games and read them one book after another, and that’s okay, but we want you to put them to sleep by 8:00 no matter what.” “Put them to sleep?” Bob asked sounding bewildered. “That’s right. Haven’t you done that before?” “Yes, but with children it has just been naps.” “They napped this afternoon. Tonight you put them to sleep.” Bob thought about this for a few seconds. “Any particular way?” Her husband laughed. “Anyway that works.” Clare moaned and bolted from her seat just as the curtain began to descend on Act II. The rest of the audience remained in place to applaud, so there was no one to obstruct her dash up the center aisle. She burst through the double doors into the brightly lit lobby, pulled out her Omnicom, and shouted “home.” Bob’s grinning face appeared on the screen. “Oh, good it is you, Madam. I am sorry to say there was a complication here but I think I handled it properly. The boys and I began a game of hide-and-seek at 7:49. Your house is very large and, unfortunately, it took me until 8:04 to find them. This made it impossible to carry out your husband’s exact instructions which were to put them to sleep by 8:00. So I was faced with the issue of whether he would still want me to do it. After carefully weighing the …” “For God’s sake, what did you do?” Clare interjected savagely. “Why, I let them take naps, Madam.” A regular contributor, Bill Finnegan reports that his short stories are finally bringing in some revenue. He has accepted cash offers from Sam’s Dot Publishing for “Reciprocity” a cautionary horror story that will appear in an issue of Cover of Darkness later this year, and from the Swedenborg Foundation for “The Apprentice” a semi-comic parable about an exorcist that is slated to be included in the November 2011 Chrysalis Reader.” Check out Bill Finnegan’s ebook on Amazon.com!

WWW.IDEAGEMS.COM

Love Kills

by Riki Vogel

Police departments don’t solve cases, like on TV. Cold cases are more typical of what happens. Unless there’s a snitch, most victims don’t get closure. Justice drags its feet. Yet, there is usually a witness—watching, somewhere. Leaning his head back, with Adams’ apple jutting, he gulped down his diet coke with a few gusty swallows. He ran the back of his hand over his damp mouth and burped. Then, he wandered over to the trashcan on the path and groped around his shirt pocket, fumbling for his pack of Marlboros. With a quick jerk of the wrist; the last cigarette emerged. Retrieving the sole smoke left, he crumpled the wrapping, flicking it to the ground. The man then leaned over, his back to the stiff breeze. The chap squinted his eyes and cupped his hand to light his last one. His blue and black lumberjack shirt covered a black hoodie with the bill of a ball cap protruding. Only a smidgen of his florid face was visible since his prematurely white beard covered most of it. The smoker stood by the trash box with its faux stone finish. It was the kind of receptacle that fits in with woodsy park settings or college campuses. He shifted weight, fidgeted, and tied and retied his army boots, killing time. A co-ed approached, jabbering on her cell phone, weighed down with a crammed back pack and a dangling bag off one shoulder. She rolled her eyes in exasperation at something she heard on the other end of the line. The blonde haired girl tripped over the gnarled roots of 200 year old oaks lining the path of this once primordial forest. The girl oblivious to her surroundings blithely trekked along, immersed in the zesty air of anticipation about trysts, romance, and Valentine surprises. Absorbed in her conversing, she never noticed the guy noticing her. The fellow took out a phone and pretended to talk till she meandered by. Then his large paw slid the gadget back in his frayed jean pocket. His slit-like eyes scanned the area around him. He threw a glance toward a parked van in the lot and titled his head for a second but then redirected his attention to the wandering girl who was mindlessly traipsing down the woodsy lane. A middle aged lady in the parked minivan watched him watch the girl laden down with book bag, purse, and iPod. Distracted by her cell phone, the pretty co-ed flip-flopped her way over the pebbly path. She giggled and shook her mane of blonde hair as she warbled on. The stadium loomed in the background, deserted on Wednesday late afternoon. After a last, vigorous tug on his cigarette, the man mashed the butt into the dirt next to the garbage; he peered around robotically with a 360 degree turn, once again. This fool didn’t spot the binoculars. Mrs. Lopossay dropped them in her lap, lowered her head, and stared down at her notepad. She picked up her pen and scribbled a few descriptive phrases, hoping he hadn’t detected her interest in him. Then, she sucked on the tip of the pen, lifted her chin, and stared out her side window, careful not to look straight ahead at him. By the time, she turned back, he’d disappeared. I slid out of my car and hurried down the path where he had been standing. My hand plunged down into my voluminous, French Provencal, quilted bag and clutched the cold metal. My footfall became soft and slow as I neared them. He nudged her with his boot. A thong with a state logo wrapped around her neck. With a final kick, her body rolled off the path. The brute jumped down and began covering her nakedness with leaves and sticks and forest debris. “You bastard!” I growled. He leaped up startled, prepared to tackle me. I clenched my jaw. I steadied my hand. I’d prepared for this moment. I’d imagined this second for months. I fired. The bullet hit his belly. He doubled over, hands trying to damn up the red flood. Three steps forward put me towering over the wounded beast. I smiled a Clint Eastward smirk. “You feel lucky?” His eyes reeling with fear made his dumb buffalo head nod yes. “You don’t deserve this.” The next bullet passed through his neck. “You deserve worse.” I gathered my saliva and spat on his face. The glob stuck in his stubble.

I took out the same construction paper red heart he’d pinned to her nipple the day he left her for dead in the dirt. He’d scribbled on it in his maniacal script, “Love Hurts.” I had slashed through the verb replacing it with another. My thumb pushed hard and tacked it to his forehead: “Love KILLS!” On TV that night, the newscaster said a dead man was found on campus next to an unconscious raped and sodomized girl. They asked for help identifying him and said his body was decorated with colorful tattoos of spitting cobras. Horror surged up from my stomach. My daughter had told me her rapist had no markings— pink and pristine as a baby. I clicked off the set. My hands threaded themselves through my thinning hair. Clutching a clump, I pulled. “I’ll be!” I said to the dark TV. I poured myself a cup of green tea to calm my nerves. The cup shook spilling its contents like a tempestuous sea. I tried to think about mundane things to stop the trembling. Stirring the tea, I remembered my aerobics instructor lecturing me on consuming more antioxidants to extend life. It made me chuckle. If she only knew that the dearth of collard greens and kale in my diet was the least of my problems. I thought about my spit and realized I’d left my calling card on his chin. DNA! Then, I calmed myself down with a simple thought: This one deserved killing too. If at first you don’t succeed…Tomorrow is another day! A shot in time saves nine. All sorts of pithy sayings somersaulted through my mind. And, if they catch me, so be it. Certain folks need killing. What better labor of love today than ridding the world of this parasite? I sipped my tepid cup of comfort; then I cleaned my glock. I had to hurry; Laura and her dad would be home for supper soon, and the tuna noodle casserole needed reheating. Maybe I should add some mushrooms to it? * * * As she penned the word “casserole,” Mrs. Lopossay smiled at the touch. Her character—a hausfrau turned vigilante, “make her day” hit man seemed credible. She paused from her chicken scratches, glanced at the dashboard clock, and wondered how much longer it would take Laura to get the required inoculations. For spring break, her daughter was going to Tena, Ecuador on a medical missionary trip, paddling down the jungle rivers in dug–out canoes. Mrs. Lopossay volunteered to drive her to Student Health for her shots. The yellow fever one could make a person sick, they’d been told. Accompanying her and leaving the car wasn’t an option because she didn’t have the requisite parking sticker, but Mrs. Lopossay didn’t mind the wait because she occupied herself writing stories. While sitting idle in her car, her thoughts took flight. Cooling her heels wasn’t a chore when her imagination ignited with those two little words: “What If?” Countless times, she’d spy some random character during interminable delays and then she’d make good use of her time by picking up her notepad and hatching plots to fit the folks she’d spy on. She preferred this past time of creating imaginary worlds to balancing her checkbook which her husband thought a wiser use of time. Stretching her neck, the mother peered up from her latest scribbles. That character was back, puffing and coughing again at the trash receptacle, and worse, staring at her. She scooted down in the seat. He threw his cigarette stub to the ground. He charged right up the path and veered off it toward her. The guy strode up to the front fender. There he stood frozen, glaring a strange, lopsided gaze through the windshield right into her eyes. His aspect seemed curious and…deranged. The mother pressed the locks and averted her eyes. She glanced out the side window. She peered into the rearview mirror. Her eyes darted forward again. This stranger still was there, planted. He leaned his buttocks partially on the hood. She couldn’t leave. She had to stay for her daughter. She grabbed the phone. “Laura, where are you?” “I’m in the parking lot, Mom, almost at your car. Turn your head to the left and you’ll see me.”

TOUGH LIT. II

AFTAW SPECIAL

Mrs. Lopossay cranked up the engine. The creep was glued to the spot. She lowered her window as Laura approached much too lackadaisically. “Honey, get in!” she yelled. “I was worried about you. The shots took so long!” Laura dawdled. She removed her book bag slowly and rubbed her arm. Already a welt had formed. “Hurry up in!” Interested, he rose from the hood, watching them, leering at Laura. She pulled the door open. “Shut the door. Quick!” her mom hissed between grinding teeth. She locked it again. “Huh?” Then, Laura’s eyes widened. “Why is that man there, Mom, in front of our car? It spooks me out.” “Hell if I know!” She slammed the car in reverse. The cocky fellow started to lumber away toward the woods. As they screeched out of the lot, Mrs. Lopossay told Laura about the story she was writing. “Maybe he saw you staring at him, Mom, and got paranoid.” “Could be.” “Maybe he sells drugs?” “Another possibility.” “Maybe he thinks you’re a private eye working for his estranged wife? It Is Valentine’s Day. Maybe he’s having a secret rendezvous with someone else’s missus?” “Yeah,” she laughed. “But he sure doesn’t look like the marrying type. He’d have to be the other man.” “He looks like a participant on Jerry Springer. Remember that T-shirt we saw at the Nasser Race—the one that said: “Mess with me and you mess with the Whole Trailer Park?” “I do!” “He looks like the face on the shirt with that blurb.” Mrs. Lopossay laughed. “I think I was staring to spook myself out, getting caught up in my silly, make-believe story.” “Seeing imaginary people again, eh?” Laura smiled. “Your coming just then defused the situation, sweetheart. Whatever his intention or whatever he supposed I was doing, he realized finally that I was simply a mother awaiting her kid, not some hardboiled detective scribbling notes on his whereabouts.” That night Mrs. Lopossay turned on Greta. She was alone as her husband often worked into the wee hours. That show grabbed her attention and kept her from checking the clock wondering when her spouse would come home. The program features heart- rending stories on missing or murdered girls, which Mrs. Lopossay viewed as a public service. Settled down on her leather couch with two fingers of scotch over ice chips, she pulled up her plush throw and was ready to be mystified by the spotlighted tragedies. With her grating voice and crooked mouth, Greta announced solemnly: “There’s an all points bulletin for a killer. They’ve labeled him the Valentine Killer because of a certain trademark he leaves on his victims. We can’t say what it is. The police won’t divulge that piece of evidence, but we can tell you this much: A man walking his dog discovered a girl on a college campus behind the stadium, down a small embankment, strangled with her thong.” Behind Greta appeared a picture of State’s stadium and then the cameras panned out and focused on the parking lot where Mrs. Lopossay had been stationed all afternoon. “Imagine that,” she said to no one at all. “Laura, is that you?” She heard a creak on her polished oak floors and then an odor wafted towards her, the smell of Marlboros and wood chips. “Miss me?” he said before he charged, arrow in hand pointed at her heart. North Carolina author, Riki Vogel (nom de plume) is the author of fifty-five published stories and articles and one novel, Secrets, Lies, and Grace by Comfort Publishing now available on Amazon.com . She has written numerous non-fiction narratives and now tries her hand at fiction.

VOL 6, ISSUE 2

Grey Goose Flash Fiction by Carre Gardner

Forty dollars will buy Leroy ten years in the slammer. That’s how long he’s held my sister prisoner in their marriage, smacking her around and taking her money; locking her out of the house, and making her rub Nivea cream into his fat, sweaty feet after work at night. She’s done her time; now it’s his turn. Forty dollars to purchase my sister a decade of peace: that's only four dollars per year; less than three cents per day. It’s literally a small price to pay for freedom. Forty dollars is the cost of a bottle of Grey Goose Pineapple Vodka, Leroy’s favorite. I buy it on Friday, and put it in the freezer overnight, so it will be good and cold by morning. On Saturday, I pack it in the Coleman cooler, in the bottom with the ice. It’s Grammie’s birthday, and we are celebrating with a picnic at Portland Head Light, as we have done every ninth of July for the last seventeen years. After the hamburgers, and before the cake, I bring out the bottle of Grey Goose and pour small measures into paper cups. We drink a toast to the old girl. Then, as I knew he would, Leroy starts in on the rest of the bottle. It’s a long, warm day, with a hot sun and a stiff breeze blowing in off the water, stirring up a light chop among the lobster boats and buoys in the bay. The nieces and nephews play tag with the waves, which are aggressive today, chasing them back up the sand, nipping at their heels no matter how fast they run. The tide is at its ebb: it is a good day to die. A good day to start living. The sun is low in the sky before my sister begins to cart the picnic things back to the car. Leroy lingers at a picnic table, over the last of the vodka, until the shadows, even his, stretch long and thin across the grass behind us. “Come on,” I say, “Let’s take a walk along the cliffs.” Leroy protests, but I pick up the bottle of Grey Goose and wave it in front of him. Like the dumb animal he is, he hoists himself up and follows the carrot. “I’ll stay here with the kids,” my sister says. “Yes,” agrees my wife, “let them stay here and play a little longer.” The rest of us start off, Grammie shuffling along on my wife’s shoulder, pausing often to catch her breath. Leroy stumbles behind them, and I take his arm to steady him. We are not in any hurry. We stop at an isolated point, looking out over the Atlantic, its waves gilded and rosy in the light of the setting sun. We might be seabirds, sitting here, poised to push off from the edge and drop into the air, the cold wind currents bearing us up, saving us from the surf pounding and boiling below. “Let’s get a picture,” I say. “We’ll take turns posing with the birthday girl.” I maneuver Leroy into position, and he drapes an arm like a ham across Grammie’s frail shoulders. “Come on now,” I prompt him, “give her a kiss.” Automatically, he obeys. For an instant, a trick of the light renders the sweet gesture menacing. But an instant is all my wife needs to snap the camera shutter before I step forward and push. Her body is surprisingly soft against my palms. I thought she would fight death with some inborn animal instinct. Instead, one moment she is there, and the next there is only empty air, and a gull swooping onto the rock where she had been standing. She does not even scream. I look at Leroy. “You pushed her,” I say. “I did?” He is stupid at first, foggy, and then his face clears, panic spreading across it like a slow flush. “I didn’t mean to push her!” “No, it was an accident; they call that manslaughter, not murder. You’ll probably do about ten years.” I hand him the bottle of Grey Goose, the last inch sloshing around in the bottom like eddies in a tidal pool. He swallows it with a long, desperate shudder, and a belch. In the morning, in the dim light of a jail cell, he won’t recall any of this. My sister’s share of Grammie’s fortune should be enough to cover his gambling debts. It’s as good a motive as any to kill. (cont’d on p 26 )

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Poetry from Prison We are proud to feature the free-style poetry by the women inmates of the Patuxent Institution for Women who write to express their feelings of love, life, and longing. We look forward to publishing more of their work in future issues in the hopes these burgeoning writers will achieve their dreams of becoming published authors. “I am currently incarcerated, and I would like to submit my poems to your magazine. I have had several of my poems along with a short story published by your magazine. … Thank you in advance for your assistance with getting my poetry… published.”

“A friend of mine told me about your publishing company, and I enjoy writing poems. I am seventeen years old and an inmate at the Patuxent Institution for Women. I am submitting my poem, entitled, “A New Lay” for consideration for publication.”

Respectfully,

Calaisha “Lay” Vaughn Inmate# 924-519

Ms. Vonunette Allen Inmate #922-069

A New Lay

Pain

A Poem by Calaisha “Lay” Vaughn

A Poem by Ms. Vonunette Allen

Thoughts on my mind, Anger built up inside, So I wet into my cell and cried. It’s the only thing I can do to keep myself in control. So as the tears pour, I let them stroll. Tired of the disrespect And the child neglect…

When will the pain end and how do I begin? Our love began so freely and full of life, yet it became so painful towards the end. Life just doesn’t seem the same anymore, and we both know this is without a shadow of a doubt. As I began to reflect back over the last two years, I was the one that caused you so much pain.

Sometimes wishing I was never put on this planet, I feel so lonely. No one I can trust When I did trust people. I was betrayed because of lust. Now I feel the tension between us. So many mixed emotions. Tired of being sick And tired, I’m fixing to blow.

I guess what you said is true: I would be the one who would end up hurting you first. I don’t know whether I was afraid of love or scared to allow you to become a permanent fixture in my life. Once I realized that you’re not like most men, I realized in my heart that you’re the one for me. I caused you so much pain that you didn’t know whether you were coming or going.

My life is something like a science project Mixed with potions waiting to explode. Can’t no one stop it? Not even me. You won’t believe what my young eyes have seen.

Maybe you’re right in that our relationship should be over due to the pain that’s being afflicted. No relationship is worth going through any of that.

So, I guess this is the part that I Suck up to. Be strong and bold And act like nothing’s happening at all. At this moment, my mind is in another place. So I’m like a corpse taking up unnecessary Space.

What would the end result be if we were to continue this journey? Do we love each other enough to allow the pain to continue? We both agreed that love is not enough to overshadow the pain. With you is where I want to be; however, the pain is unbearable. Our love is pure and rare, yet the heartbreak is driving me insane.

Vonunette Allen’s first publication, From Victim to Victimizer to Victorious, appeared in our September TOUGH LIT issue. Vonunette has been a generous contributor to our magazine with her stories and poems.

I can smell it in the air, Unable to tell if it’s a sweet or a foul taste. But I know that this is the start of a New Lay…

Calaisha “Lay” Vaughn is brand new to our publication and the youngest author we’ve published to date. We want to thank her for her literary contribution and encourage her to write, write, write! We certainly look forward to more from “Lay” in future!

TOUGH LIT. II

AFTAW SPECIAL

Locked Up

by Gillian Scott

Strange but true!

The telephone rang. Hurrying to answer it, I picked it up on the third ring. It was quite honestly the most amusing, phone call I believe I have ever received. It was Derek my husband calling to tell me of his most upsetting morning. Actually, I probably shouldn’t refer to it as amusing as he was without doubt, terribly upset! Derek is an attorney. His fields of expertise are in Corporate Litigation, Real Estate and Divorce. However, he also represented mentally ill patients whom the state tries to force into treatment. On this particular day he was representing such a patient. By all accounts it was a pretty straight forward case. Derek's task was to attend a court hearing held at the mental health facility, and with his client, try to show that the young man was of no danger to either himself or others, thus not needing to be forced to remain in locked treatment. The necessary affidavits from the attending medical staff had already been obtained. Now, it was just a question of speaking with the Judge. Nothing out of the ordinary, nothing particularly challenging! The hearing was scheduled for 10:00 A.M. Derek had decided to arrive at the facility an hour earlier so that he could meet with his client to go over his statement one last time before the hearing just in case there were any last-minute questions. Additionally, he wanted to allay any anxieties or fears his client might have about what would be expected of him in the hearing room. The facility orderly escorted my husband down to the ‘holding area’ where his client was being detained. So far, so good! I should mention that my husband is not the most conservative of dressers. Add to that the fact he is somewhat color blind. His idea of appropriate attire could, on occasion, be compared to dressing for a Halloween party. On the day of the hearing, he was wearing a blue jacket, orange shirt and green slacks. Need I say more? (In all fairness to Derek, he was to play in a golf tournament after the hearing, and as such, this was acceptable attire… minus the jacket!) Aside from his dress sense, Derek does have a number of wonderful attributes. He’s kind, generous and extremely compassionate, as well as being both a terrific husband and father. Anyway, having entered his client’s locked room, the orderly informed him that when his visit was over, merely to knock on the door and he would be escorted back up to the hearing room. Derek proceeded to sit down opposite his client and go over their case. After the visit had concluded, he knocked on the door as directed so the orderly could let him out. However, unbeknownst to him, during his time in the holding area there had been a shift change. The new orderly on duty approached the door and asked Derek what was the matter? When Derek replied, that he was the acting attorney, had just finished briefing his client and would now like to be let out, the new orderly simply looked him up and down and with a smirk on his face and replied, “Of course you’re an attorney! And I am the king of Siam! Isn’t the food here just terrible?” Derek initially thought the orderly was just being funny. However, when he refused to let him out and walked away, my poor husband now panicked. He hammered on the door and yelled for the orderly to come back. This only made the situation worse, as the staff now apparently considered him unstable and in need of restraint. Two orderlies unlocked the door and proceeded to put Derek in a straight jacket. Watching this scene unfold, his client was totally bemused, but felt fortunate to have his attorney as a new roommate.

VOL 6, ISSUE 2

My husband was then unceremoniously carried off, all the while screaming obscenities at the incompetence of the two beefy men dragging him along the corridor. He loudly threatened something about suing the facility for everything it was worth. Halfway down the hallway, his co-counsel miraculously appeared puffing and panting, with sweat beading his brow, from searching all over for his lost partner! The judge was waiting and was perturbed that neither the client nor the attorney was in the hearing room. Taking stock of the situation unfolding before him, his partner found it quite hilarious. Should he rescue his dear friend and workmate or continue to watch how Big Mr. Attorney, Derek, handled this awkward dilemma? Fortunately for Derek his co-worker’s good conscience won the day and after a fair amount of explaining, all was resolved with Derek able to return to the hearing and secure his client’s release hence, winning his case! Needless to say, the old adage that clothes make the man might merit more consideration in future. Gillian Scott was born in the United Kingdom and emigrated to the United States in 1981. She currently resides in Tamarac, South Florida where she is married to local attorney Richard Entin. She has one daughter, Farrah, who currently attends university majoring in Criminal Justice. Gillian is becoming a regular contributor to our magazine. Her book, Island People can be found the Publish America website: www.publishamerica.net

I Keep Holding On A Poem by Vonunette Allen I don’t know what it is about you that I keep holding on to. I’ve come to terms with what we had is in the past. As much as I try to hold on to my past, it’s killing me deep inside. I have to let go in order for me to grow. My present life does not include you nor does my future. I don’t even understand the type of love we shared. Was it really love? Or was it just in the meantime? I keep holding on to something that was never there. All I ever wanted was to be loved, yet all it was is a lie. A sexcapade turned into more than what we ever expected. It’s amazing how you played on my vulnerabilities and tried to say it was love. Love doesn’t hurt the way that you hurt me or even left me for dead. I guess my love was just a game for you to play when you were ready. Now is the time for me to spread my wings and soar to great heights without you in my life.

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Little Boxes

by Amanda Garretson

Based on a true story!

He sat on the picnic table, with his chin in his hand; his eyes and thoughts were elsewhere. She looked at the eyes that were not looking at her. They had shared their first intimate hours in this neglected garden; much had changed since then. Both had chosen the dramatic detour that permanently altered their reputable lives. The path led her to hesitant happiness. Where had it taken him? They had returned to bury a friend, but what they unearthed were answers to the tangled events that had sent them away. * * * The kids and I were eating apple pancakes for dinner, in front of the TV, enjoying the placid predictability of the Star Trek plot and a mild sense of naughtiness while we waited for their father to call. We all jumped when it rang; Jax and I fumbled with the remote before he grabbed the phone, pressed “talk,” and tossed it to his sister. Lily turned, handing the phone to me without speaking, revealing her face for the first time since she’d been home from school. She completed the turn that twisted her from the floor and toward her room, brushing wet ponytail strands off her hot face. “Natalie, are you there,” I heard Frank’s insistent voice from my lap. “I’m here,” I said quickly, watching Lily leave. “Can I call you back in a few minutes, Frank?” “What’s going on? Is everything okay?” “Yes, yes.” I said impatiently. “I just have to check on something. I’ll call you back in a few minutes, okay?” He agreed to dismiss me, and I hung up. “What’s going on, Jax?” I asked as I followed my daughter. He was two years younger than Lily, and her opposite, but they shared an intuitive familiarity between them that made secret keeping difficult. “She won’t tell me, I don’t think she even heard me asking,” he answered. The four of us left the anonymity of city life six years ago to find a simpler one, and we found it in Waverly, Indiana. Our Post-civil war farmhouse was a short bike ride from the ball fields and fairgrounds where the kids spent most of their time, we knew our neighbors, had room to grow up, and we were safe here. I refrained from picking up her muddy soccer shoes when I entered Lily’s room. She and Jax had been fishing at the Whitewater River campground the day before, the poles were still leaning on her dusty dresser, and I imagined the faint smell of scales and fins coming from her closet. Lily was delivered, almost fifteen years ago, with an agenda, and she stuck to it with her father’s pragmatic tenacity. Cute dresses and hairdos were not on the agenda but she was comfortable that way, which was fine with me. An interest in boys was inevitable, even though she resisted the maturity that was closing in on her, but “boy crazy” would never define her. I laid my hand on the back of her head, and heard her muffled voice say, “I think I’m pregnant, Mom.” I suppose I heard her, as hearing was the only one of my five senses left with some faint functionality. The remaining four had slammed shut against a squall accumulating under huge bellied masses of black and purple. Her quiet words boomed an impending thunder trumpeting an unforgettable storm. She told a rational story of crossing from the safety of innocent curiosity into the uncharted currents of adult choices from which there was no turning back. She tried to put the puzzle pieces together herself, using my presence as her prompt, while I sorted through very different, smaller jigsaw pieces. The serene image on the box had laughing children playing softball on a summer evening with parents in lawn chairs discussing PTA projects, and church picnics. I felt the smooth round edges of each piece as they snapped into their proper places one after another. A large glass shard had just replaced the next piece. It had no converse connection to match it, and my effort to force–fit the jagged intruder made my desperate fingers bleed. I held the shard tightly in my

lap waiting for the pain to send the appropriate message to my brain, but all five senses were now boarded up, in a futile attempt to protect the pretty puzzle. She fell asleep with her damp cheek burning into my chest, where my soured past pounded, gurgling up from noisy dark places into my throat threatening a premature projectile. I was planning to deal with my childhood stuff someday, but “now” always pressed its priority. I sat on the sofa looking at the phone. Frank had called, but I didn’t want to talk to him, he would fly into action and I needed to think. Zeda Bellingham was a flurry of flamboyant activity too but we had a way of turning our words into logical solutions when we got together. She was my closest friend and mirror opposite. Zeda’s very large, very dark-brown eyes, short wavy form, and gypsy spirit, were gifts from her Greek mother. She vented her full store of vital energy, in an operatic voice, symphony violin, that flipped to a flying fiddle depending on her mood; and she could form and spit out an opinion before I could say my name. The color she splashed everywhere paled my whimsical creativity. It was late, but I knew she’d come. As usual, when Frank wasn’t home, she swirled in without knocking, rustling scarves, and skirts around her. She sang: “Where are yoooouuuu?” in her operatic alto, as bottles clanged on the tile counter. She lit candles, and poured wine, as I watched her, once again trying to picture the overweight, dowdy child she claims she’d been. “Being ugly makes you desperate for attention,” she’d said, “which makes you do stupid things.” Her confidence was my inspiration as I struggled between enjoying the attention my height provided and dreading the daily “Do you play basketball?” queries. I planned to respond, “No, do you play little league?” someday, but knew I never would. She perched on the couch facing me, holding one knee, “Start at the beginning,” she said, “and go ‘til the end.” I did. Zeda flinched almost imperceptibly when I froze on the word “pregnancy,” but she responded before I exhaled. “Go on,” she urged impatiently with a brush of her hand; as if sweeping away ten long years of a fatiguing fight with infertility. “This isn’t about me,” she said. I continued until the frail tale ended. There wasn’t much to it, just a skeleton with no flesh and blood, no teeth, and no grave. The mantle clock ticked off silent seconds waiting for us to undo the unknown. “Let’s plan your conversation with Frank first, she said softly, then, I want to get you in to see Mitch.” I met Zeda six years ago in the Waverly Washhouse Laundromat while we were both still glowing from big city lights and before furniture and order were delivered to our new homes. She was throwing a fanciful assortment of costumes into a dozen washers, singing a melody that was as lively as her laundry. “Clothes need as much respect and recognition as those who wear them,” she announced. She talked and I smiled as we folded clothes together, and I sat listening to her long after we’d finished washing and drying. The pages of her big city past were vague, short stories of the mystery genre. She’d been married and divorced, the latter driven mostly by futile efforts to conceive. The battle for a baby continued in her new town, a quest that introduced her to Mitchell Shepherd, the best private adoption attorney in the Midwest. She’d found a job and a friend in Mitch, and like a child’s allegiance to Santa Claus, believed in him completely. I needed to place my family in trusted, experienced hands – whether his eyes twinkled, didn’t matter to me. Mitchell and his boys went to our church, where I knew his name well, but I had never met him. Anyone who read the local news knew about Mitchell Shepherd’s contributions to our community. His tireless efforts with unwed mothers, the crisis centers, and foster parent programs he’d

TOUGH LIT. II

AFTAW SPECIAL

started were renowned. He represented controversial protesters, and pushed for the restoration of the town’s historic district to spur economic growth instead of pursuing the higher revenue of outskirt mega-stores. The low interest renovation loans he’d promoted enabled the arts and small businesses to revive and flourish, while the political controversy behind their endorsement churned quietly beneath the downtown cobbled streets. “I need to talk to Frank before I take any action, Zeda.” “You need to hammer your thoughts down first,” she said. We couldn’t end a conversation without one of her artful assessments of my husband. “I wish you’d stand up to him, you’re bigger than he is.” “Taller, Zeda, not bigger, there’s a difference.” “Well, your feet are bigger,” she retorted. The McCormick, Granier, and Shepherd building was a modern architectural behemoth on the outskirts of town. It was the den of Mitch’s opposition and an incongruous place for him to be. I’d have to ask him why he worked for the firm that opposed him so directly, when I had a chance. I stood in front of the revolving doors, putting on my confident face in the reflection, before pushing through them into the echoing marble lobby. “Geez, I wish people looked at me like that,” Zeda said, stepping out from beside the security desk. “I wish they did too,” I replied. Mitchell Shepherd stood and spilled his coffee when we walked in. He shrugged and smiled, leaving the spreading puddle to drip. I looked up, just a little, into his eyes; they did twinkle - his whole face did. “I’ve told Mitch what’s going on,” Zeda said as she mopped up the coffee and retreated. “I’ll be back later,” she said, and closed the door behind her. His tie was loose, and I imagined it stayed that way. His lightly salted beard hadn’t been trimmed and he looked like he’d rather be fishing or having coffee around a mountain campfire than sifting through the red tape and opposition of his profession. He and his office were an unpretentious anomaly in the feigned panache of their surroundings, and I felt at home. “That’s a cheerful troupe,” I said, looking at the prominent photo on the credenza behind him. Two impy-eyed boys and a wife were smiling in the frame. “My boys are amazing,” he replied, with his eyes fastened on them. He poured two mugs of coffee for us, without spilling, and settled down opposite me. I was with him for more than two hours, before seeing my watch and panicking. “Carpool, gotta go!” I grabbed my purse, flung the door open, and fled for the opening elevator as it “dinged” from around the corner, and collided with Virgil McCormick. The impact did little to disturb his slick dark hair but his eyes flashed in quick anger, until he focused on me. “No apologies necessary,” he said, reaching for my hand. “I’m Virgil, senior partner here,” he said, “And you are?” I removed my hand from his and introduced myself, as the elevator left without me. Frank was there when we got home from a silent carpool ride. I halted with one foot on the garage floor, surprising myself by thinking of the grocery receipt I’d lost. He’d have more to worry about tonight than balancing a budget, I thought. I took a deep breath and followed the kids inside. I sat on a stool at the counter where he was mixing egg and breadcrumbs into hamburger with his hands. The sight of it made me queasy. “Let’s go into your office, I have something to tell you,” I said, sounding meeker than I had practiced. He just stared at me while I waited to be struck by his blame. “How is she?” he said. I exhaled my relief before replying, “Confused, distressed, scared, and way too quiet, and I’ve been to see Mitchell Shepherd too,” I said, leaving out the obvious detail that he was Zeda’s boss.

VOL 6, ISSUE 2

“When did she tell you? Why didn’t you call me? Why did you start into this without me? What have you told, Jax?” The questions kept coming and I tried to keep pace with answers that I didn’t have. By the time we came back to the kitchen, he was simmered and anxious to question his daughter. We ate silently, waiting for Frank to open the discussion. “Lily, we’re going to get through this,” he started, before choosing the words that would explain to Jax what was about to happen to our family. He did a good job laying out the facts. Jax cried, and reached for his sister’s hand, I cried for Jax, for Lily, and for the end of their childhood’s simplicity. “Here’s what we’re going to do,” Frank said. The plan was logical. We’d take Lily to our doctor to get the facts, meet with the boy-father and his parents, talk to our pastor and the school principal about the tumult ahead, and get together with Mitchell Shepherd to discuss the adoption of Lily’s baby. There it was, all wrapped in a practical package with contents, delivery date, and destination all plainly written in black and white. Frank had laid out a clear solution in five minutes. Lily and Jax looked lost, as Frank asked if they had finished their homework. “I’m going to bed,” Frank said as he let out a long breath. “I need to call Greta,” I replied. “I’ll be up in a few.” He rolled his eyes and said, “Right, I’ll see you in the morning.” I wanted to flee to my stepmother’s hippie home, burrow under the quilts of the marshmallow mattress on the screen porch, and follow the moonlight off the end of the pier to watch the tidal marshes of the Coosaw River catch cattails on Lady’s Island in South Carolina. I needed to talk to Greta but dreaded recounting the movie script story that was playing out in my home. But this drama wasn’t fiction; artful fabrications presented on film draw tears that dry fast in the fresh air of reality. This wasn’t going to end when the lights flicked on, and the click, click, clicking, of a spent spinning reel slowly stopped. “Greta?” She’d been sleeping but didn’t say so. “What’s going on, Natalie?” I started crying for the first time. After I explained what I could, she responded with a verbal combination of a hug and a kick in the pants, “You’ve got some big hurdles in front of you,” she said. “You’ll need to take them one at a time. Are you ready to risk trusting yourself, and stop fearing the respect you’ve earned?” “Wow,” I said weakly, “are you telling me to grow up?” “You’re already growing into that long, body of yours, you just have to get comfortable in it,” she pushed on quietly. “Wicked stepmother,” I pouted. “And you’re my lucky daughter?” she smiled into the phone, “now, get some sleep honey.” I heard Jax’s voice murmuring in Lily’s room on my way up to bed. They must have been talking for hours. Frank’s discordant energy chafed as I strained to get out of bed. I poured coffee and misplaced the cup, I forgot to eat, and stared blankly at my makeup and the unfamiliar face in the mirror waiting to be covered with it. The normal nudge of guilt was my only motivation to continue through the following days. The doctor delivered the ill-timed truth. The boy-father was a mystified child, with the weight of the facts unable to penetrate his youth. His parents were as helpless as he was; not defensive or denying, just at a loss to find the beginning strand of responsibility that would help them unravel their shroud of disbelief. And it was strange that Zeda hadn’t called. Mitch phoned Saturday afternoon to let us know he was on his way over. I made coffee, and waited for him. Through the kitchen window, I watched the autumn wind blow his hat toward the door in front of him, playing “Catch me if you can.” I opened the door for him, smiling as he blew in bringing along a few leaves and a faint smell of chimney smoke in the leather of his weathered jacket. He fit the muted outdoor colors and clear air of autumn, and filled the inside of my kitchen with enough (cont’d on p 32 )

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Painting the Parlor

by Barbara Pelt McLay

Edgar Potts hated painting. He wasn’t an artist. He was a house painter—like Hitler. He could almost understand why the man turned so mean. Maybe if Adolf had taken to drink, as Edgar had, he would have been a kinder, gentler dictator. Painting takes its toll on a man. Beer kept Edgar mellow, but he only drank one bottle a day. Sharon, his wife insisted on that. Nevertheless, about three or four times a year, Edgar needed whisky. Though most of the times his jobs went well—his crews showed up and were sober; the rains held off enough to let him finish a job on time; his customers paid, and their checks didn’t bounce—about three or four times a year, things went wrong, and only whisky helped. Edgar hated looking for jobs, trying to find cost-effective places to advertise, and paying out hard-earned money to try to get more work. He hated estimating the cost and profit. If he was wrong, he’d end up losing money instead of earning any, as the crews had to be paid and paint purchased even if the customers didn’t pay enough to cover costs. He hated dealing with unreliable helpers who didn’t show up when they were supposed to and who lied about their qualifications. He hated dealing with fussy customers who were never satisfied that the color was what they had asked for or the price was what they’d agreed on. He hated trying to collect final payments from shysters who delayed until he put a lien on their properties. He hated the smell of paint. Changing from oil to latex didn’t help. He hated paint! He’d started painting when he dropped out of school at age fifteen. He didn’t like school, and his mother, Abigail Evans, needed him to help support his six younger siblings after his step-father died with lots of debts and no insurance. They’d been evicted from their four bedroom house, so his mother lied about the size of her family and rented a two bedroom shack far enough from town that nosy neighbors couldn’t easily count her offspring, not that they’d care if they could. Edgar would ride the school bus into town each morning—he was too young to officially drop out of school—and then knock on doors looking for work of any legal nature, though illegal would probably have been all right with him if anyone had offered something, short of killing anyway. But most of the jobs he got involved painting something. When he was eighteen, Edgar bought a rusty old pick-up. This allowed him go further afield for jobs, and soon he was earning enough to help his family move to a larger house. He got his painter’s contractor license when he was twenty-two, and started his own company, which now had an office in Smithville with a nice sign in front. He had four painting crews, and a full time secretary—currently his daughter Alison, a recent community college graduate. His other kids worked for him, too. His two sons and daughter, Annie, all got licenses and could do the work as well Edgar could. The kids didn’t seem to hate painting. In fact, Annie loved it. He hadn’t told Winston and Walter, his sons, that he was going to turn the whole company, over to Annie in five years, maybe sooner. It was very much a family business, but Annie was the oldest, and the boys could either keep working for her or go start their own business. Until Alison had taken over, Sharon, Edgar’s wife, had been his secretary, or office manager as Alison preferred to be called. Edgar’s current big project was to paint Folston’s Funeral Parlor, inside and out. The outside was being handled by Winston’s crew, but Edgar was supervising the interior work because they had to work from eight at night to five in the morning, hours when the business was closed. A crew of four plus Edgar painted anywhere from one to three rooms per night. They started on the second floor, offices, a break room, copy room, rest rooms, even a bath room with an old fashioned tub. Like many funeral homes, Folston’s had once been an old mansion. The first floor was more offices, reception rooms, two chapels, two small rest rooms. All went well, until the crew moved to the basement, the place where the real work of the funeral home was done. It was one thing to paint around dead bodies nicely laid out in silk-lined coffins with the lids closed and flowers all around. But the basement contained two rooms with ugly tables, drains for blood, and god knows what else. It was cold as Alaska in

February down there, and compared to the smell of formaldehyde, the paint smelled like violets. Edgar would sometimes stick his nose near an open paint can just to block the nauseous chemical. The rooms were big, with high ceilings and lots of small window along the top at ground level. Old layers of oil paint had to be scraped and the walls cleaned before they could repaint with latex. These basement rooms could not be done in one night, more like a week each. The crew and Edgar persevered until one night. There was only the one room to finish, and in that room was a naked dead body lying on one of the tables. Mr. Folston had neglected to warn Edgar of its existence, or to even put a cover over the poor deceased man. Edgar had entered first, having to use a key to unlock the door to the embalming room, and when he saw the body, he told his men to wait outside the room. They were already on the clock, and waiting was much better than painting, so they stood and talked while Edgar went inside. Fortunately the others were walking far enough behind him that he was able to shut the door, blocking their view while he searched for some covering to put over the corpse. He found a white sheet, covered the dead man, and called the crew inside. As soon as they walked in, Jeb stopped, stared at the table and asked, “Hey, boss, is that what I think it is?” “We’re working in a funeral parlor, Jeb. It’s a dead body. You’ve worked around dead bodies for all of this job.” “Yeah, but it’s sort of different when they’re in a nice coffin. You can see the shape of this guy. It’s too creepy. I don’t think I can work in here tonight. I don’t want to paint while a dead body’s looking at me. The other men laughed, but nervously. They didn’t want to work in there with the body any more than Jeb did. Edgar was very glad he’d covered it before he let them in, or they’d probably have walked out without discussion. “You’re not painting the damned body. You don’t even have to go near it. It’s in the middle of the friggin room. Set up the scaffolding and get started. I want to finish this job tonight.” Edgar’s hadn’t used foul language since his first child was born, and now he kept it clean for the grandkids. The men though it was funny that he cursed like an old lady, but “damned” and “friggin” signaled that Edgar was getting extremely angry. So, they averted their eyes as best they could and started to work on the huge room. They didn’t know that Edgar was not mad at them, but at Folston for not covering the body at the very least. He didn’t blame the men for being uncomfortable. The smell and the cold were horrible enough without putting dead bodies in their way. Setting up scaffolding to paint the twelve-foot high ceiling took almost an hour. Before nine PM rolled around, Edgar was rolling the green paint from the five-gallon bucket onto the wall, and the four others were standing on scaffolding, two on each side of the huge room, painting the ceiling white. At midnight, Edgar was getting optimistic that they’d have the job done by seven if the men would work two hours overtime. Since he had to pay them time and a half, he didn’t think they’d object. At five past midnight, the dead body sat up and went, “UHHHH.” Its legs were still stretched out on the table, its arms by its sides, but the cover fell off, and the men could see its open eyes and lots more. Edgar could never say exactly who did what in what order, but the next thing he knew, Jeb stuck his foot in the bucket of green paint, tipped it over and made a trail of green tracks for the door. The trail continued over the cement basement floor, up the wooden staircase, across the luxurious carpet of the first floor, out the front door, across the wide wooden porch, down the fine old brick steps, and away into the night. You could hear Jeb’s yells over the other ruckus, and there was plenty of ruckus. Mike had been on the same scaffold with Jeb, and was probably no less frightened. Jeb had kicked the bucket of white paint on his way to the green paint, and it spilled all over the floor, down Edgar’s back—he’d

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been bending over underneath—and on the scaffolding, making Mike slip and fall. Mike might not have slipped in the paint and taken the fall if he hadn’t been trying to run to the end of the scaffold to jump off. He landed in a puddle, picked himself up and laid a white trail next to Jeb’s green one. The other two workers, Hank and Wally, performed much like Jeb and Mike, except Mike slipped in the paint on the floor and skidded out the door on his back instead of running. Wally stepped on him and kept going. Mike rolled out the door and across the carpet before he got onto all fours and then onto his feet just before he went out the front door. All four men had thrown the paint-filled rollers every which way, so the body was now green and white as were the walls, tables, lights, everything in the room, and beyond. Edgar saw the body only seconds after the men, and while surprised that it could sit up and say “ah,” he didn’t run. He sat down, put his head on his knees and sobbed like a baby. He was ashamed of himself for bawling, but he couldn’t stop. Edgar hated painting. He didn’t know why the body sat up. He didn’t care. It was probably some practical joke being played by Daniel Folston or someone who worked for him. Lord knows where his men had run to. They’d brought their own cars to the job, three cars, as Jeb and Mike lived near each other and carpooled to work. They’d all get themselves home and cleaned up, and Edgar would probably let them work again, but not in a funeral home. When Edgar went to his truck to get a bucket, scrub brush, and detergent, he saw that Wally and Hank’s cars were both gone, but that Mike’s truck was still in Folston’s parking lot. Edgar spent two hours cleaning the porch and steps so that Folston wouldn’t be immediately greeted with disaster. Let him at least get the door open. The carpet was going to have to be replaced. There was no point in even trying to clean that up, nor was there any reason to go clean the stairway and the embalming room. He’d have to get a full crew in, and it was going to take several days, maybe a week. Folston would certainly blame him, even though Edgar knew it was really the fault of whoever rigged the body to sit up, and Edgar would have to pay for the new carpet in addition to paying wages to four men for a week to clean up the mess and then another week to repaint the room. Folston’s employees would have to clean up the body. Edgar wasn’t touching it, not even to see what made it move. He was soaking wet and covered in paint, and was going to be broke when he replaced the carpet and paid the men. Edgar hadn’t had strong drink in four months, but this was one of those times when he needed whisky. He cleaned himself up as best he could, using the hose, bucket, and detergent, applying the scrub brush to his shoes, arms, and hands. He kept two or three tee shirts in his truck, so he threw out the one he’d been wearing and put on a fresh one. His trousers were in pathetic shape and wet from the hose, but at least the paint on them was dry now. He was presentable enough to stop in a bar, the kind of bar he liked anyway, and Sharon wouldn’t expect him home until daylight. He drove himself to Charlie’s. It would be open until three. That allowed him plenty of time to temporarily block out this disaster. He told Charlie his sad tale, and Charlie agreed that someone had rigged the body. He even looked on the Internet—business was slow—and dead bodies do not sit up, though they can make noises, something about gases escaping. By three, Edgar had drunk half a bottle of Jim Beam, shot by shot. He put the tab on his credit card. At closing time, Charlie insisted on calling a cab, saying Edgar was much too drunk to drive. Edgar said a cab was a good idea, so Charlie didn’t take the truck keys. Charlie was a nice guy, and he figured Sharon would bring Edgar to retrieve the truck early tomorrow morning, before the bar opened. But Edgar was a devious drunk. As soon as Charlie’s back was turned, Edgar scooted out to the parking lot and began a slow and careful drive home. It wasn’t far, and he’d driven home drunk many a time, but this time he didn’t make it. He thought he’d made it, but when he got to the door, it was locked. He wondered if Sharon had been frightened by something. He tried several

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keys on his ring—two truck keys, office key, file cabinet key, two other keys that might have been door keys. Nothing fit the lock. Sharon wouldn’t have changed the locks. They were on good terms when he left for work the night before, and there was no way she could know yet that he’d been to Charlie’s—unless Charlie had called her when he found out Edgar didn’t take the cab. He gave up on the front door and went around to try the kitchen door. It was a glass door from top to bottom. Funny how that bottom glass had got there. He only remembered a window in the top of the kitchen door. And there were two doors instead of one. But maybe he was seeing double and there was really only one door there. The door was unlocked, so he slipped quietly inside and was surprised to see that Sharon had moved the bed into the kitchen. What a brilliant idea! He could just roll over and get coffee in the morning without putting his feet on the floor. He shucked off his filthy clothes and crept naked into bed beside his wife. Sharon was sleeping soundly. At last, a stroke of good luck! By the time she woke, he’d be sober and he would escape husband-cide until she got the credit card bill. Sharon didn’t stay asleep. Edgar had barely got his head onto a pillow before she hopped out of bed and started screaming at the top of her lungs. Then she turned on a light so bright it blinded him. It felt like a lightening bolt went though his eyes into his brain. Next another woman came running in—Annie? Alison? He couldn’t see. Everything was blurry. He tried to calm his wife. Maybe she couldn’t see either and didn’t know it was him. She wasn’t expecting him home until daylight his foggy brain told him. “Sharon, Sharon,” he pleaded. He tried to say more, but he couldn’t get the words out. Then he suddenly realized he was buck naked in front of one of his daughters—he still couldn’t figure out which one. He tried to get into his clothes, but they were too tangled and nothing worked. Someone seemed to have sewed up all the openings. Everything looked all wrong. There was carpet on the kitchen floor—not right. Where were the sink and the refrigerator? Gone! No stove either. How could Sharon change everything around so much in just a few hours? While he was pondering all this, two deputies arrived. They were fine fellows, his friends, maybe relatives. He knew their names, but he couldn’t remember them, so he addressed them as “officers,” in his most respectful manner, or tried to. His tongue wouldn’t work right. They helped him into a car and drove him to a nice comfortable bed where he slept the rest of the night away. When he awoke in the morning, he wasn’t in a bed. He was on a sofa, his own sofa. He felt terrible and he couldn’t remember anything for a few minutes. He was still in his work clothes: paint-spattered khakis and a sweaty tee shirt. He sat up. His head spun, but when he was able to focus, he noticed the tee shirt was on front to back—not so bad except it had a pocket which was on his back. He was embarrassed to think he might have been out in public dressed like this. Oh dear, he’d been in Charlie’s bar. Memories began pouring in, horrible memories of events he’d rather forget—imminent bankruptcy! And Folston might kill him if Sharon didn’t. Where was Sharon? Edgar lay on the sofa most of the day, only getting up to pee a couple of times. He brushed his teeth, threw his dirty clothes in the hamper, took a shower, and got dressed about noontime. He seemed to be alone in the house. His stomach was so upset he didn’t want any food even if Sharon had been there to cook something or make him a sandwich. His truck was in the yard, but Sharon’s Toyota was gone. He couldn’t find his keys, but he didn’t want to go anywhere anyway. He lay back down on the sofa and slept some more. About three, he awoke to see Sharon sitting in the chair across from the sofa. She was just staring at him. He sat up. She said nothing, just continued to stare, mean, cold. “Oh, honey, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. I can’t remember anything after going to Charlie’s. I got drunk. I did it on purpose. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I had the worst day ever yesterday! You won’t believe how bad things were. I needed a drink. Sharon, honey, you’d have needed a drink if you’d had my kind of day!” (cont’d on p 30 )

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Heirs of Justice, Pt 2

by Rosalie H. Contino, PhD

Reminiscent of Dragnet, Part 1 appeared in our September TOUGH LIT issue. Here’s the recap (just the facts, ma’am): One summer night, two boys in their early twenties went for a ride. Kevin Myers and Mark Stephano had been best friends since they were children. This ride ended in tragedy when their car slid off the road and hit a tree, killing Kevin instantly. Kevin's mother, Claudine, is shattered with grief. However, what looks like a random horrible tragedy may prove to be much deeper and perhaps more sinister than Claudine ever expected. * * * “It was a warm night, and the droning of the air-conditioning was getting to me too. I decided to take Sammy, my lab, for a night walk along the road.” Watson looked at the jury with a smile. “I do that a lot.” “What time was it?” asked Jeffreys. “Oh, I guess about 12:00AM.” “Why do you remember?” “Because the news was over, and I waited to see the opening segment of Dave Letterman to see who the guests were.” “And you didn’t want to see them.” “No, when I checked the time at 11:50 PM, I realized they were probably going to be on toward the end of the show. I told my wife I was going to take the dog out.” “Isn’t it dangerous walking along the side of the road so late at night?” “No, there’s usually no traffic because it wasn’t the summer yet. Just one of those warm early summer nights when we all brace ourselves for the onslaught of summer folks from Memorial Day to Labor Day.” “What did you see?” “The dog started to growl when suddenly I saw a car racing up the road towards me, I pulled Sammy over to the side.” He looked at the jury again. “I don’t know who was more scared, the dog or me.” “Why? Didn’t you ever see a car racing on the road in this area?” “The car was weaving from one side to the other. It looked as though the driver was aiming for me. When I jumped away from the road and nearer to the trees, the driver straightened out the wheel and kept going, then suddenly slammed into the tree.” “Did you see who was at the wheel?” “Yes, the young man sitting there.” “What was he doing?” “Driving or trying to drive. He looked as though he was fixed on something.” “What do you mean?” “I don’t know whether he was looking for a space to pull over or...he looked as though he lost control of the car and crashed. Strange, an absolutely, strange night.” “What did you do?’ “I always have my cell phone with me. I called 911. I told them to send a fire truck to with the ambulance as it looked as though the men were locked in or half hanging out. I called my wife to tell her what happened because I’m sure she heard the noise. I knew she would think I got hit by the car. It was horrific!” “Was there anyone else on the road?” “Yes. A driver. He wasn’t walking. He jumped out of his SUV to help. We both ran to the car but we could see that we couldn’t do anything. We were concerned that there would be a fire or an explosion. We wanted to pull the kids out. But that was impossible.” “Why?” “The driver’s door seemed to be stuck and he was out cold, slumped over the air bags, the steering wheel. I pulled the door, and, er, as Mr. Barano raced over. We both tried to open the door but it was stuck. The ground was slick, as it had rained the night before. It wasn’t that hot to dry quickly as it does in the real summer heat. The other, the passenger, the deceased, was half hanging out of the car. We didn’t know if he was dead or alive.” Watson’s eyes filled up with tears. “I’m sorry.” Watson reached into his

suit pocket and took out a handkerchief, “Excuse me, excuse me, please,” he said teary-eyed. “a mess, a real mess...People started running over from all sides to see if they could help. We, Mr. Barano, and I told them we couldn’t do anything. We all stood there hopelessly. We didn’t know if we tried to pull the bodies out we would have done more damage. We were afraid that the car would slide down more and cause more damage to the kids and trap us as well. We were sliding down a bit, too. ” “What about the ambulance and the police?” “They were there in no time. Well, it seemed that way. The fire department showed up pretty quickly too. They told us to stand back so that they could do their work. And a lot of work it was.” “Did the police ask you any questions?” “Yes, I gave them what I saw, and what I knew. They thanked me and said if they needed to ask me more questions they would call.” “Did they?” “What more could they ask me? It happened so fast. That car flew up the road and in a second, it was all over.” “Mr. Watson, look at these photos,” Jeffreys turned on the TV. “Want to show the jury what you mean?” Jeffreys asked the witness. “Sure. If it helps.” Watson got up, took the pointer from Jeffreys and point to the crime scene. Jeffreys handed the pointer to Watson. “What do you see?” “Exactly as I described. The driver was slumped over the air bags and he was wedged in his seat. Face was bloody. He looked as though he was in a mangled situation.” “What about the passenger?” “His arm looked as though he was trying to grab the wheel or his arm fell out that way, I don’t know. You know what they say about “It could be conjectured...” (A snicker could be heard from the courtroom.) From where I was walking, I only saw the driver behind the wheel. I don’t know if the passenger tried to hold him back to straighten the wheel or the impact of the crash rearranged his body or perhaps his arm slid slowly over his body, I don’t know. There was a glimmer of light when the trees moved. When I walked over to the other side, the passenger looked as if he was wedged in on an angle, like his body had slid under the hood of the car. The rest of him was hanging over the doorway. The door, itself, was wide-opened, hanging on a thread. The car crashed into a tree or slid down and landed on a slant. I think. I mean, that’s what it looked like. When Mr. Barano came to help, we noticed that the car slid a few inches. We moved back and when we heard the sirens, we breathed a sigh of relief.” As he spoke, the camera switched from the bystanders to the jury, and their reactions to his account. Claudine’s face showed no emotion, just listened as hard as she could. She knew Watson and his wife. They were a kind and generous couple, always looking to help people. Their kids were long grown, had jobs, and lived in Connecticut. “Thank you Mr. Watson. I’m glad you clarified the term “conjecture expression”. The coroner and police will clarify what evidence there is to see if Kevin did grab the wheel. Questions, Ms. Megan?” Megan stood up and said to Watson. “You didn’t like Mark very much, didn’t you?” “Excuse me?” Watson was dumbfounded. “I don’t understand what you mean? I didn’t cause the crash.” “He gave you a run for your money when was younger, didn’t he.” “He gave all the neighbors a run for their money. Not only me. You doubt my word that I saw the crash? I didn’t touch him. Ask the other gentleman if he could have pulled either one of them of the car.” Watson answered nervously. “Get to the point, Ms Megan,” admonished the judge. “He almost ran your dog over a few years ago on his dirt bike, right?” “Yes,” he smiled, “I forgot about that.” “So, he wasn’t the best kid in the neighborhood, right?” “Have you seen our area? Amville is a very small town in New York. This

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is not the big city! There is no room for a kid to go and down the area on a dirt bike. We don’t live on the prairie, or don’t you know that?” Watson snapped. “Oh, of course,” Megan softened her tone, “I’m sorry. Did you think he was trying to get you or get even with you?” “I doubt it very much. He has passed me many a time when I was outside my house. I don’t remember him swerving to scare me to be funny. He knew damn well that I would call his parents in a sec.," the senior snapped. “They are a law abiding couple. I know they have had their hands filled with him over the years. We all knew they did. We are a small community. Our friends and kids know each other. I guess my dog knew his car when he came barreling down the road. If he didn’t bark maybe I wouldn’t have been so quick to pull him off the road. God, it happened so fast.” Watson looked at the jury, “You never know...you just never know.” The camera focused on Claudine. She was afraid to smile because she remembered these incidents. Watson asked Claudine how she could let Kevin have Mark as a friend. Claudine remembered those incidents. They were such opposites. Maybe, she thought, I should have put a stop to the friendship. But, she rationalized, who knew? And just like Portia in the Merchant of Venice, when she maintained that “the quality of mercy is not strained but droppeth like a gentle rain from heaven” Claudine could only hope for the best of where it landed, and who it really benefited. “One more question, Mr. Watson, you said the ground was slippery. How slippery would you say, sir?” “Like from one to ten or thereabouts or enough to send a car off the road?” Watson answered sarcastically. “How would I know how much of a skid would send a car off the road! I’m no expert!” The courtroom had a field day with this unexpected comment and the camera was there to catch the smirks, guffaws and shocked looks. “Sorry, Mr. Watson. I didn’t mean to insult you. Thank you.” Ms. Megan looked up at the judge. “I’m finished, your honor.” “We would like to call Mr. Barano, the driver of the SUV who ran to help.” Barano, a distinguished-looking man about 60, walked over to the witness box. “Raise your right hand, ‘Do you promise to tell the truth and nothing but the truth?” “Yes, I do.” “Do you know the boys in question?” asked Jeffreys. “Not personally. My sister lives in the town and I was visiting her that week.” “What did you know about them?” “My sister likes to fill me in with details of some of the neighbors or friends in the town. It’s a small community. I knew that Kevin received a nice scholarship for medical school and that he seems to have it altogether and that Mark was still ‘a bit immature’, but that she liked him. Whenever he saw her carrying groceries, he would put them in the car for her or carry them into the house.” The camera switched to catch a slight smile on Mark’s face and his eyes fill up with tears. He kept his head down. “She hoped that he would grow up and cut out the shenanigans and make his parents proud.” “What can you tell us about the evening?” “I saw the car in front of me weaving a little and driving erratically, but I didn’t expect it to crash so fast. It looked as if the driver had the car under control until I saw it had crashed. I parked quickly, called 911, and jumped out of the car to see if I could help. Mr. Watson and I tried to open the driver’s side, but it was jammed shut. We saw that there was nothing that we could do. We checked the passenger side but realized we could do nothing. We didn’t want to do too much because the road there was slick, with from a rain storm or gas, or oil from a car. We both called the police and requested the fire department and ambulance.” “Looking at the photos,” Barano said, handing him the pointer, “When you looked at the wreckage, what did you see?” “The young man there,” he said, pointing to Mark, “was slumped over

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the steering wheel out cold, over the air bags. It was hard to see if he was dead or alive. I walked over to the other young man. He was wedged or stuck under the dashboard and the other part of his body was half hanging out of the car. Mr. Watson mentioned his arm. His arm was resting on his lap. See, as in these photos here. Mr. Watson and I were afraid to touch either one of them. As we stood by the tree side, the car slid a few inches. I don’t know the area and wasn’t sure how far down the car could slide. There were no lights on this road. It’s a real country road. There was moonlight, and when the breeze went through the trees the moonlight shone a bit, not that much. We panicked and moved back quickly. Other people were running to the crash from all directions. We heard the sirens, so we knew help was immediately on the way.” “Thank you, Mr. Barano. When you see these photos, is there anything else you might have missed?’ asked Jeffreys “No, not really. When the car slid down a bit, we could see it and we heard it. We were afraid it would land on us. We moved away. As I said, we were happy to hear the sirens.” Jeffreys nodded to Megan. “Mr. Barano, why would you discuss any kid from the town when you visited your sister? Isn’t that rather unusual?” Ms. Megan asked. “Oh, my sister had gone food shopping. When Mark delivered the packages, she filled me on who he was.” “So you never met him before that day.” “No, not to my knowledge.” “What about Kevin? Did you ever meet him or anyone in his family?” “Maybe in the stores. I really don’t know him or his family.” “Fine. Thank you very much.” “You may step down now, Mr. Barano.” The next two “eyewitnesses” were the fire and police department. Claudine listened with a half a heart as she saw they pointed to where the accident occurred, how the bodies were found, how long it took cut the two young men out of the car, if there was a problem with the steering mechanism, or if there were blown tires that might have caused the crash. Fire Chief Spano was a long time friend of the community and gave almost the same testimony as the witnesses. She knew Police Chief Morgan. She taught his daughter in the first grade. However, Megan was insistent, when Morgan was on the stand. “Is it possible that Kevin grabbed the wheel from Mark and caused the crash?” “It is. From what we could see when we arrived, Kevin’s arm was on his lap and the two gentlemen stated that the car lurched and moved down a little. One witness thought he saw the deceased’s arm slide to his lap. Unless you have someone actually there and filming, it’s hard to say. There wasn’t too much light unless the breeze moved the leaves and some light. It’s a very dark road. I do know one thing for sure. For someone who was becoming a doctor, he did not have his seatbelt on. I checked it for frays and there was nothing wrong with it. That might have saved his life or cause less damage to his body.” “What about the oil slick residue from the rain that could cause the car too swerve?” “It depends. Many of us drive over worse slicks in the roads especially during snow weather but if you’re driving fast on a dark road, where you live, it becomes problematic. If the driver paced himself, noticing a slick road, then he wouldn’t have crashed the car. “Thank you very much, Police Chief. Any questions, Mr. Jeffreys?’ Jeffreys shook his head. “No.” Claudine, too, was satisfied with their testimonies when they spoke because Megan couldn’t poke holes in insisting that Kevin caused the crash. “The evidence leaned more and more towards Mark killing her only son. So be it!” Claudine thought. “Well, said Judge Manero, “I think we’ll call it a day. I received a note from the both lawyers that we’ll have the coroner’s report tomorrow and two witnesses who will be testifying tomorrow. I expect the jury not to discuss the case and expect you to be here tomorrow morning 9:00 AM, sharp. Any questions?” (cont’d on p 35 )

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Journey of a Victim

by Theresa Stone, Inmate #920-106

Today, I was born: a sunny, cold December day in 1967. Most people would describe the day as mild, moderately mild, with a promise of snow to come. I would describe the day as the beginning of the end. You see, the doctors are calling me a crack baby… whatever that is. They put me in a special nursery with other babies who are sick. Am I sick too? My mother is in another room. She hasn’t held me yet. The doctors say she can’t nurse me or crack will get into my system. They say my APGAR score is 9, which is normal. All of my organs and other parts of my body appear to be normal, but the doctors are worried about my future. They say I will likely have behavioral or mental difficulties as a result of this crack stuff. That’s what they tell my mother. My mother feeds me formula and holds me, but I cry a high shrill scream filled with pain. My mom asks the nurse why I cry so much. The doctor intervenes and explains that constant crying is common to babies born addicted to crack. He further explains that just as she is withdrawing off this terrible drug, so is her baby. This makes my mom cry too, but the doctor is unsympathetic and does not offer her comfort because he knows she’s a drug addict and that is what she has subjected me, her baby, to as well, making me drug addicted while in utero... an innocent victim. This would be the first of many times I would be referred to as “victim”. The doctor then advises my mother of the hospital’s intent to contact Child Services. H explains that I have rights, that I am a victim. My mother continues to cry until she falls asleep. I am already asleep. This is the first day of my life. The second day that I am in this world, the New York streets are blanketed with snow. It is bright, white, and inviting. People are bustling about their day, oblivious to the human horrors of the streets that surround them. I am a product of those streets: the son of a prostitute mother addicted to crack cocaine and a drug-dealer father, now deceased. This is what my mother tells the social worker from Child Services, a young Asian lady who appears a little older than my mother. The woman wears a name tag that reads “Sarah Choo, LSW.” Sarah writes everything down in a file that has my mother’s last name: Wilson. I haven’t been given a name yet. My mommy tells Sarah that she is homeless and cannot possibly keep me. What does this mean? Why couldn’t she keep me? She made me! Am I going to live with Sarah? The doctor? The nurse? Who? I wail loudly while my mother’s tears stream down her face. Why is she crying? She’s the one who doesn’t want me! Sarah explains that even if she wanted to keep me that I would not be allowed to be released to her care because I was born with crack in my system. She continues to explain to my mother that I have rights. She also calls me a victim. Maybe that’s my name? Just then, the nurse takes me. She tells my mom that they will be doing further tests for any diseases. They will also be taking my footprints in case I ever get lost. Aren’t I already lost if my mommy can’t keep me anymore? The hours pass. The snow continues to fall. Its color and brilliance is fading to gray as cars and people trample through it. Its beauty doesn’t last long. The filth of the streets invades the peace and tranquility that always comes with fresh fallen snow. It correlates with the first days of my life—a beautiful new birth marred by the filth and the effects of addiction. The nurse returns me to my mother’s arms. It’s me, Victim, and I am alone with my mommy. She’s holding me,

rocking me, as she gazes out the window. She sings softly. Her voice soothes me. Her skin is soft, milky white. The touch of her hand feels good. She murmurs softly, “I Love you, Mario. I’m sorry I messed up. You deserve so much more, my precious boy.” Mario? Who’s that? My mother continues to rock me, her melodic voice singing softly as her tears fall and land upon my rosy cheeks. My eyes become heavy and sleep prevails. Day three of my life brings me more sad news. The doctor tells my mother that she will be discharged today. The social worker, Sarah Choo, and hospital administrators enter and tell her to sign my birth certificate, some hospital forms, and the consent form provided by Sarah. They tell my mother that I would be staying at the hospital a few more days for monitoring, that visiting would be permitted. My mommy nods her head, her long red hair shielding her face s she cries silently. Once again, I feel her warm tears fall on my face as she holds me. Don’t cry, Mommy. I’m Victim. It won’t be until years later that the full impact of that title would become clear to both of us. My mommy kisses me, feeds me, and changes me for the last time. Tearfully saying goodbye, she hands me to the nurse and walks back out into the cold streets, back to her addiction. As days pass, then months, I am placed by Child Services with the first of many foster homes. The foster mother feeds me, changes me, bathes me. There are no kisses or touches—no signs of affection. Her voice is unlike my birth-mother’s. There are plenty of other children here for a total of seven, including me. I am the youngest. I still cry a lot. My foster parents don’t like that. They tell the doctor that I am fussier than the other infants they’re caring for. The doctor assures them that it will get better, that it’s not colic but the effect of having been born addicted to crack—a victim’s cross to bear. Even the older children find my crying annoying. They make ugly faces at me. Mostly, they just ignore me. It’s lonely being a victim. At least they let me keep my name, the one my first mommy gave me: Mario. Months turn to years and my problems continue to grow. Again they say it’s the result of being born a crack-addicted victim. There’s that word again. I’m seven years old now. I go to elementary school like a big boy. I like school, but it’s so hard to focus on what the teacher is saying. I get bored and fidgety. I want to talk to my classmates, but they are all listening to the teacher or doing their work. They get mad at me when I keep talking. Then the teacher does too. She gives me a couple of chances, but I can’t stop talking. She sends a note to my foster parents. I’m in trouble for continually disrupting class. My teacher calls me the class clown. That sounds better than victim. Clowns have happy faces and make people smile. I make everyone mad. The school principal suggests that I see a doctor for my incessant talking, but my foster parents think that it’s just a phase. Because they have never had a child born a “crack baby” in their care, they are not aware of the possibility of my special needs. Besides, they have other children to care for. My foster father works and my foster mother has a set of infant twins. There is no time for doctor’s appointments for an insolent boy, who they believe just needs a good spanking. I get them, too, but I still disrupt the class. The spankings get worse. The bruises start to become visible. The welts from the belt across my back are red and swollen and clearly defined. Child Services sends me to another foster home. I get sent to a new school. I hope I’ll do better so nobody will get mad at me. It’s hard being a victim. It hurts so much… Today, I am turning twelve. I’m in my sixth foster home. It’s much

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better here, especially since I’ve seen a doctor about my behavior. The doctor told my new foster parents that I have ADHD, Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, which is often diagnosed in children born a crack-addicted victim. There’s that word again: the label, the constant reminder of why I don’t have a real mommy. I have to wonder why my real mother did drugs. Didn’t she know they’d hurt me? Didn’t she care? If I could see her, I’d ask her. The doctor put me on medication to calm me down and make me concentrate, but it makes me feel strange... like nothing matters… but I get good grades. There are no more spankings, no physical pain, but the loneliness is always there. I talk about this with my therapist. Yeah, I have one of those too. She understands how I feel, having a white mom and a black dad because her parents are the same and she’s adopted. She never judges me. She just listens and helps me cope with all my problems. She also helps me to understand who I am… other than a victim. When I was born, they said I had rights. I wonder what that was all about. I hope someone explains it to me soon. Is it like the right to vote? Maybe I’ll ask my therapist next session. The years continue to pass. There are both good and bad times. Thankfully, I no longer require the need for medication for my ADHD. I’ve just started college. I received a full academic scholarship. I’m majoring in Sociology and I plan on becoming a licensed social worker, specializing in youth. I want other victims of drug addiction, either born into it or led into it, to know that they have an advocate who understands that they are not alone. I’ve finally found out what those rights are that child Services were referring to, and I intend to educate others so that they will understand that although they are victims, they are survivors, capable of overcoming, achieving, and persevering. Recently, I’ve create a webpage: http://rightsoftheshildvictim.com. It’s nothing fancy; however, it’s very informative. These are my rights as a victim. These are the rights of every child victim: Bill of Rights for Every Child Victim I have a right to be represented by the state in which I live. I have a right to be loved and cared for. I have a right to a safe environment. I have a right to medical treatment: both for mental health and physical health. 5. I have a right to an education. 6. I have a right to pursue my dreams. 7. I have a right to search for my birth parents. 8. I have a right to know why I was made a victim. 9. I have a right to educate others. 10. I have a right to my feelings that have resulted from being a victim. 11. I have a right to be the best that I can be! 1. 2. 3. 4.

In my studies, the sociology textbook refers to a term victimless crime. What a joke! For every action an individual makes, that action affects another person or persons in some way. Whether it be an official crime or merely an immoral act, victims are born and made every day. For example, an attempt at suicide is considered a victimless crime. HELLO! What about the people left behind? There are always victims when one indulges in conduct unbecoming, for lack of better words. Let’s face it. If there were victimless crimes, then there would be no need for Victim’s Rights. There would be no Victim’s Impact Groups for incarcerated offenders. There would be no Victim Notification when offenders are released from prison. Fortunately, legislation is on the victim’s side and gives us some protection and some programs to help us deal with our individual victimization.

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I’ve been thinking a lot about my birth-mother lately. It’s time to reach out and try to find her. I have so many unanswered questions, so many emotions aching top get out. I need to do this to heal, to feel whole, for closure. I’ve composed a letter, and I’m placing it on my Facebook page. I’ll also forward it to a website for children in foster care, as well as my own website. It reads as follows: Dear Mother, I wanted you to know that I’ve grown into a man that would make any mother proud. I am a college student in graduate school. I work and also volunteer mentoring boys from troubled homes. I encourage them and give them hope of overcoming the name they’ve been given: VICTIM. How familiar since that’s what I was born. Why is what I’d really like to know. Why didn’t you just abort me? Why did you continue to smoke the crack pipe with me inside of you? Couldn’t you have put your selfishness aside long enough to give me a chance at life? Couldn’t you have gotten help or treatment? Why did you do this to me? Why, Mother? I don’t hate you, but I do hold you responsible fro bringing me into this lonely, cold world… a victim… at the hands of you, my own MOTHER, my source of life! Now, I do realize that you are also a victim, but YOU are a victim of your own self-destructive choice1 That will never excuse nor justify the fact that you destroyed my right to having a real mother, a real family, a safe haven, a normal loving childhood. You stole that from me. You chose to be a victim. I didn’t! You chose to be a drug addict. I was brought into this world a drug addict by proxy. Then you left me all alone to deal with your mess! I hope it was worth it for you. I want you to know that I forgive you. I have to in order to feel whole, to have the peace of mind I deserve. I pray that wherever you are, you have gotten clean, that you are okay. I hope you’ve forgiven yourself and that you recognize the gravity of your actions. If you read this, I hope you’ll respond. Who knows the future holds… for the both of us? Your truly, Mario Wilson (the name you gave me) Theresa Stone was raised in Baltimore and is the mother of three boys. She worked in the medical field for many years. Her hobbies include quilting, reading, and mentoring youth. She is currently an inmate at the Patuxent Institute in Maryland and is working toward her AA degree with a focus in Sociology. Theresa works as a Prison-toWork Program clerk. She has just begun writing her first novel. Here is what Theresa wrote to us: “I saw your [listing] in the International Women’s Writing Guild…and I am submitting a copy of my short story for your consideration. Please note that when I had written down your information, I had not even started my short story but only had a string desire to write. I am an inmate at the Patuxent Institution for Women at Jessup, Maryland… We had a writing contest a few months back for Victims’ Rights Week. This was the first time I had ever written a short story. It was suggested to send you a copy for consideration for publication.”

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Cold Hard Steel

by Mary Chrapliwy

er palms began to sweat. As the sun rose, she sat in her favorite

chair beside the brass lamp embroidering, head bent low over her work, the lamp making her short, wavy white hair a halo around her head. The needle and cloth grew moist as it absorbed the sweat from her hands. The cloth made squeaking noises as she stitched. Ruth sighed and put down her embroidery, rubbed the palms of her hands on her pants. She gazed out the window at the brilliant orange of the rising sun. She shivered with the thought of what had occurred just a few hours ago. “Mom!” her daughter Jane had screamed, pounding on her front door. “Help me!” she continued to scream at the closed front door, her voice a high-pitched wail. Ruth had been peacefully stitching, but Jane’s screams sent her to her feet, tossing her embroidery and running to the door. The hair on the back of her neck stood on end. Jane rushed in as she opened the door and turned and slammed it, throwing the deadbolt in place. Ruth gasped at the sight of her only child’s terrified face, swollen with tears and covered in bruises. “Oh no, what am I going to do?” Jane sobbed, eyes darting around the landing. She looked like a wounded animal, seeing specters where there were none, seeking escape. Ruth put a protective arm around her child. She wanted to shield her from any further harm. Richard’s truck roared into the driveway, throwing up a cascade of gravel. “Janey! Get the hell out here!” Richard thundered on the other side of the door, slamming his fists into the door mere inches from where they both stood. Ruth cradled her daughter’s face in her hands. “Did he do this to you?” Ruth whispered. She was hoping she was mistaken in her assumption that Richard did this. Jane and Richard had only been married for a few months, they seemed happy. Jane didn’t answer. “Has this happened before?” “Yeah, but never this bad before.” A trail of tears trailed down over Jane’s bruised face. “He’s been pushing me around. He apologized and I thought everything would get better. Then we had an argument today and he pushed me again so I told him I had enough and was going to leave.” Jane said, choking back a sob. “Oh, I should have kept my mouth shut, I should have waited.” She backed away from the door as Richard continued to pound on it. She began to sob, cringing against the wall. “Where’s Daddy?” she asked. “He’s out of town on a business trip, honey.” Ruth said, her heart pounding. “Jane! I said get out here!” Richard boomed, slamming his fists into the door. Ruth knew no one would hear him out here in the isolation of the country. After all, the closest house was far down the road, a mile away. Ruth grabbed her daughter’s hand and pulled her up the stairs to the master bedroom, closing and locking the door behind them. They looked out the window overlooking the driveway. Richard was lifting a gas can out of the back of his pickup truck. They watched him pour gasoline all over Jane’s car, then splatter it onto the sidewalk as he made his way to the front door. There was no sound for a few minutes. They scarcely breathed in the ensuing silence. Then the silence was shattered as the front door crashed open and slammed into the wall. “I’ll find you!” he yelled from the front hall, “and if I don’t find you I’ll burn this house down!” They could hear Richard’s heavy steps coming up the stairs. He went

to the only closed door on the hallway, the door to the master bedroom. Mother and daughter stood holding each other watching as the knob turned slightly and stopped. Jane began to whimper while Ruth looked around the room for something to grab to fend off her daughter’s attacker. Ruth knew the little lock on the door handle wouldn’t hold him off for long. Unfortunately, there was no time to think or grab anything. All Ruth could think was to stand in front of her daughter to protect her. “You think you can keep me away, you rotten bitch?” Richard yelled. Moments later they stood in a shower of wood splinters as he broke his way through the door, the flimsy hollow door and handle lock yielded easily to his work boot. He stood there smiling, his towering body filling the doorframe. “Come on, it’s time to go home,” he said, grabbing Jane roughly by the arm. “I told you not to go anywhere. Now you’ll pay.” Ruth felt helpless watching her whimpering daughter being dragged away by this monster. “It’s okay, Mom.” Jane said looking back over her shoulder at Ruth. “Really, it’s okay. Don’t worry,” Jane said, squinting her swollen eyes with pain. Richard continued to drag her out the door and pushed her roughly into the pickup truck. He picked up the gas can and threw it at the front door of the house. “Glad I didn’t have to use that, Mother,” he said menacingly to Ruth, who stood watching by the broken front door, her throat constricted with the smell of gasoline and her own sense of panic. A moment later, he had hopped into the truck and was screeching out of the driveway. “Oh my God, oh my God, please help us.” Ruth prayed fervently as she ran back up the stairs. She wasn’t sure what she was going to do, she only knew she had to defend her daughter. She searched through her husband’s closet for the one thing that could stop Richard forever. “I know you have a gun in here somewhere!” she muttered, brimming with fear and frustration. She began pulling things off the shelves, tossing sweaters and shoeboxes behind her. There it was, in a wooden box at the back of the top shelf. She seized the box and pulled it open. The long, dark gray barrel shone in the early evening light. She remembered the many times she scolded her husband for keeping the gun loaded, now she was glad it was. She gently lifted the gun out of the box. It felt cold and heavy in her hands. She stared at it for a few moments. “I’ll shoot the bastard!” she uttered to herself, staring at the gun and turning it in her hands. The weight of it was solid and reassuring. She felt calm and sure of what she would do. She grabbed an empty purse from her closet and shoved it inside. Just as she was about to leave the room the phone rang. “Hello.” Ruth answered the phone, her voice laced with impatience. She hoped that it was Jane calling to tell her she was somewhere safe. “Honey, it’s me,” her husband said on the other end of the line. “Is everything alright?” he asked. “It sounds like something is wrong.” “There’s no time, I have to go!” Ruth said. She squeezed the telephone receiver in her now sweating hands. “What the hell is going on?” “Jane was here, she has bruises all over her face. Richard came and took her. He was yelling at her and threatening her. I have to go,” she shouted into the phone. She dropped the phone and ran. Ruth grabbed her car keys from the front hall table and ran toward what was left of her front door, slipping through the front hall on the gasoline Richard had dumped there. She was clutching the heavy weight of the purse under her arm. She could feel the reassuring

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shape of the gun through the side of the bag. She got in, started the car, and threw it into reverse, leaving a shower of driveway gravel in her wake. Ruth sped toward her daughter’s house. When she made it to the main country road, she slowed down so she was driving within the speed limit. She didn’t want to take the chance of being pulled over by the police. She didn’t want to waste precious time. She had to get to Jane. She had to rescue her from that monster. Ruth slowed the car down as she entered Jane’s development. It had grown dark. She parked around the corner from Jane’s house. She killed the headlights and slid out of the car, easing the door shut. She held the gun-laden purse under her arm and strode around the corner. She felt eerily calm as she rounded the corner. There were three police cars with lights flashing, along with officers with their guns drawn and pointed toward the front door of Jane’s little house. Oh no, am I too late? She thought to herself. “Lady, you have to stay back there,” an officer said, laying his hand on her arm. “My daughter’s in there! What’s going on?” she shouted at the officer. “Your husband called the station and reported that there was trouble here and a neighbor called reporting that he thought he heard gunshots. We came to respond and no one would open the door.” “Is my daughter alright?” Ruth asked, knowing that she wasn’t. The thought that Richard might have shot Jane made her throat feel tight. “So far as we can tell,” the officer responded. “We could see her standing when he came to the window to close the curtains.” “Did he…” “He had her by the neck, ma’am.” “Come out with your hands up and no one will get hurt,” an officer announced with a megaphone. The door opened slowly. Richard stepped into the doorway holding Jane around the waist with his left arm, holding a gun pointed at her in his right hand. He slowly eased forward, an odd smile on his face, white teeth glistening in the spotlights from the police cruisers. He began to laugh, laughing low at first, then put his head back and bellowed. His bellow turned to a grunt as Jane slammed her elbow to his groin. When his grip eased, she slipped from his grasp and ran toward Ruth, arms outstretched. For a moment the three of them seemed to be the only people in the world as Richard growled, “Bitch,” and lowered the gun toward Jane’s back. Ruth pulled the sleek, cold gun from the purse and shot Richard. The sound of her gunshot was drowned out by the loud booms of gunfire from the police. Ruth tucked the gun back in her bag and Jane ran into Ruth’s outstretched arms, which wrapped tightly around her daughter. Richard lay in a heap near the front step, gunned down. After it was all over, the police took statements from Ruth and Jane. Ruth never told them that she had also fired her gun. She wasn’t sure if she would ever tell another living soul. The police followed them back to Ruth’s house and did what they could to reinforce what was left of the front door. Now Ruth sat as the sun rose, looking at her daughter’s small form curled up on the couch, an afghan wrapped around her. Ruth knew what she was capable of now, just how far she would go to protect her daughter. She tucked the afghan around Jane’s shoulder, then picked up her embroidery and began to stitch once again. Mary Chrapliwyy is a graduate student at Rowan University and is set to graduate with her MA in Writing in May 2011. She is an editor of art and nonfiction for Rowan's Glassworks magazine. As a busy RN, she has had a lot of experience with nonfiction in the guise of writing and teaching patient education

VOL 6, ISSUE 2

materials. She has written a novel and is hard at work on a second novel. Mary is actively looking for an agent. She is also an amateur genealogist. You can find her on blogger and wordpress.

The Unwanted Visitor A prose poem by Donna E. Krause There was a loud hallow knock on my cracked aged door…….upon answering it …..I fell to my knees….as the dark bleak hooded figure arrived within a black cloud….terror washed through my body….in a foggy abyss this figure screamed out….Bipolar Disorder, and it’s for life! It crept back in it’s horrible domain….I’m left with dark depressing thoughts….a chemical unbalance in my brain…my blanket over my head…I want to sleep, to escape these pangs of sadness that engulf me…there is no more salvation, in looking at the rays of the sun….suicidal ideations are so real to me now…How can I live with this deep feeling of doom….loved ones are pulling me…and saying, you have to stay, we love you! ….they don’t have a clue…the anguish is pronounced now...my tasks are too much to bear…..while this disorder is pulling me down so far…How can I get up, again? As I struggle with deep depression….a new wild ride took me to the land of euphoria…..Mania is causing my brain to rush forward like a hamster on it’s wheel…There is nothing that I can’t accomplish…my credit cards are my friends…..feeling incredibly agitated, as my quest to buy more increased….as I pedaled away on my bike…I’m telling the world that I could sing!......Don’t they know that I’m riding away to OZ!....ah, sleep for me is rare…there was too much to do and see….my anxiety is on overdrive….I feel like I am riding in a hot air balloon…completely floating away from reality. I checked myself into a hospital, with a sense of knowing that my actions are bizarre…..Lithium is their drug of choice….a magic pill…..It’s causing me to feel more balanced and free….thirty-two years later I’ve scratched and clawed out of many deep dark depressions and manic episodes….I’ve received very good care….my children and husband remind me that I’ve done something good...it has been my life’s goal, to ignore that dark hooded figure when there is a knock upon my door.

When Love Dies A prose poem by Donna E. Krause When I look back…….I see a teenage boy that I met perchance….many years ago…so remarkably handsome, so gentle and kind….at the tender age of sixteen……Was I falling in love? Those sweet young years were the happiest times in my life….How could I forget those trips down the shore……as the lights reflected the shore….he said that he was in love…..but was it a school boy crush?...Our wedding so perfect….like a page from a romantic novel…the dance as man and wife…. so elegant so new…I thought I was floating on a cloud….Our honeymoon was filled with promises and sweet aspirations…the pink sands of Bermuda mingled with the pure blue ocean…The scent of exotic flowers followed us, as we walked gently on the sands… Bermuda was stamped in my mind forever. However, something robbed me of this sweet life… the word Bipolar was in my midst…My depression poured over me, like a dark, ugly veil…. It was for life, they said…..When I had better times, we had three beautiful children…….they were my purpose in life….I found no greater love…the years swept by like a rapid heartbeat…my illness and his alcoholism didn’t call for good bedfellows….and know in my later years….I wondered where did our love go? Will this anguish continue to the ends of our lives? Only God could answer that question…the question that takes a chip off my heart, every day…….I long to be that girl, who was just sweet sixteen…….who thought that our love would never die………..

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Officer Friendly

by Jeanette K. Cakouros

We often challenge our writers with difficult writing problems, such as telling a story with nothing but dialog. The beauty of this one is that IT REALLY HAPPENED!!!

" s something wrong?" "Jeez Ma, does something have to be wrong just because I called?" "No, of course not. Ah, is school good this year?" "Guess so. Is Dad there?" "He just left for a Y Board meeting. He'll be back in a couple of hours." "Well, I went to Providence to see the Grateful Dead and–" "That's where they had the riot! Did--?" "That was Monday night, Mom, when I was coming back to school, remember? I went on Tuesday." "Thank God! ......I didn't know you were a Deadhead." "I'm not really. I never went to one of their concerts before. How'd you know about Deadheads?" "We may live in a hick state and be over 30 but we're not illiterate, you know." "Yeah, yeah... Oh, we still didn't get to see the Dead, though. I was in jail. A cop beat me up." "Are you all right? I knew something was wrong! Why? What did you do?" "I got a black eye and a broken arm and I didn't do anything, except what about 50 other people around me were doing – walking around outside the stadium with open beer cans." "Your arm, did a doctor look at it?" "Yeah – it's in a cast but not 'till after five hours in jail and we got back to school..." "Oh Jimmy! That's terrible! But there must be more to it than an open can of beer!" "There wasn't. I was with Jessica and Albert and his girlfriend and we walked in front of this car, it was stopping, ya know. Everybody was walking in the street anyway. A cop jumped out. It was an unmarked police car. He ran right past some other guys and punched me in the face. He knocked me down and came down on top of me – that's when he broke my arm – and kept sitting on me while he put handcuffs on me and used his radio to call another police car." "Why would he pass others doing the same thing to grab you?" "I dunno. Maybe because I walked in front of his car." "You didn't hit him back?" "No," "Are you sure you didn't do anything else?" "MOM!" "All right, all right. I believe you. It's just so hard to understand why a policeman would do a thing like that." "He was a big blonde guy, but two other cops took me to jail in a different car. One was a black guy. He said they were Sarge's cuffs. Jeez, they were so tight I had to sit sideways. I kept asking them what I'd done and they just told me to shut up." "But how could they put you in jail for public drinking?" "They charged me with assault, too, but when they let me out they didn't mention that, just the fine for public drinking. 'Course that was when they fingerprinted me and threw me in jail for five hours. No rights. No phone call. No nuthin’. Jessica and the others were there all the time, but they wouldn't tell them anything either. The same one that handcuffed me came to the station and frisked me and squeezed my balls...." "Testicles."

"When I jumped, he said this one's awful nervous about his balls and strip-searched me." "What can we do?" "Jessica tried to talk to Internal Affairs, but they gave her the brush off." "If we don't get anywhere there, we'll bring a civil suit against the man. He must be sadistic! Somebody's got to stop this sort of thing." "It won't do any good. But do whatever you want to. It's just a waste of time." "Why?" "You and Dad should have warned me that there's no such thing as an Officer Friendly!" Jeanette K. Cakouros ("Keiko's Vacation," "White Gold," "Lightning Strikes Twice," and "Tiptoeing through the Tulips") has been a freelance writer of essays, reviews, news articles, and features published nationally. She also wrote and delivered personal essays and prepared reports for Maine Public Radio. She is switching to fiction, which she used to write in childhood. Her first novel in that era was Molly Fly and the Seven Little Flies Take the Train, but the only copy blew away from the backyard.

Mariel A prose poem by Donna E. Krause Mariel so full of sweetness….her spellbinding eyes…almond shaped…One could lose themselves…by staring at the stars…twinkling in and out of her precious eyes... Mariel expressed herself with captivating brightness….she had a comical nature that amused her listeners…laughing until they cried…friends were drawn by her shiny presence…her caring ways…a pathway to friendships. Her hair was done to perfection which matched the elegance she possessed…Mariel, gone to heaven as God wanted…taken in a blink of an eye…a tender 15…time for proms, graduations, college aspirations…mother will always adore her…a hole never to be filled by another…pictures, a special portrait, tugs on her mother’s heart strings…Mariel’s loving personality peeks through unforgotten memories…her beauty, her heavenly glow…appears like sparkling diamonds…God will be ready someday to fulfill her mothers dream…to be with her, once more, ever more… Donna Krause resides in the suburbs of Philadelphia, Pa., with her husband and cat. She is a proud mother of three. Donna attended Gwynedd-Mercy College and graduated Cum Laude, in Sociology and Social work. Donna has experience in the mental health field as a therapist. She is in tune with others needs, as she is a spiritual person. Donna is well read in Psychology and spiritually based books. She writes poetry that centers on what inspires her in life. Donna is also an avid movie buff.

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AFTAW SPECIAL

Death by Foreplay

by Dawn Ray Cord

Chapter 1

I froze mid-step with one foot literally hanging a few inches above the ground. A sharp tingling wave of awareness and adrenaline crashed over me, a second too late. A huge hand covered my mouth. I was yanked back and up, thowmp, against a man’s chest, solid and hot. He jostled me, grabbed me harder, knocking down almost all of the books I was carrying and pressing the last two into me, squashing my breasts and lifting me clear off the ground. A primal defense kicked in pushing my kindergarten teacher brain aside. I got a sense of him. Tall. I'm 5’7"; this guy felt about a foot taller. "Whoa, easy.” His voice was gravelly and he smelled like cut grass and sawdust. “You shocked me,” He said. “What have you got? Some super radar in the back of your head?” He very slowly bent down a little so my feet were touching the floor again. “Got a little carried away there. You surprised me.” I surprised you? I thought. Yup. That’s me. That’s what I do. Surprise guys by having them cover my mouth just so I can get the jump on them. “I’m not going to hurt you.” Strangely enough, I believed him. "If you won’t scream I'll take my hand off your mouth. Promise?" I nodded. Then I tried to snatch a glimpse of him. "Uh-uh-unh, no peeking,” he said. He kept one hand on my chin and it prevented me from looking around. “You can’t attack someone on library grounds,” I said. “It’s holy territory, like a church or a cemetery." "Sorry I startled you." "Startled me? Startled me! You scared me out of my sunscreen.” I stomped on his foot. Then I kicked straight back. My heel connected with his shin with a sharp crack. "Ugh, that wasn’t necessary. I said I'm not going to hurt you." “You said that, but you’re squashing my boobs and you’re behind me where I can’t see you.” I rammed my elbow into his ribs, putting my whole body into it. He bent over and I used the momentum to whip him over my shoulder, fast. He slammed into the cement. Unfortunately, he didn’t let go of me. I had to roll with him. I ended up lying on top of him. "Oomph," he said. “Argh,” I said. It was the first intelligent conversation we’d had all evening. The loud thowmp of his body hitting the pavement was really very satisfying. Over 200 pounds smacked flat on the sidewalk. Now that's gotta hurt. We were stunned - him from the impact, me that the move actually worked. I recovered first. I rolled over and sat on his stomach, straddling him. The neck ruffles on my favorite white cotton shirt were smashed. My navy ankle-length skirt rode halfway up my thighs. Not exactly intimidating. Miraculously, I still held one large hardcover textbook. I pressed the edge of it to his throat and leaned on it. He stared at me with pale blue eyes that were so close together I almost went cross-eyed. "I'm sorry," he said. "I'm. Not. Going. To. Hurt. You." “Boy, you’re repetitive. I’m glad you’re not going to hurt me, because I am going to pulverize your ass. I don't want to get hurt back." I realized I was trash talking. Stalling. He smiled - it wasn’t pretty. His six teeth were a matching yellow to his six strands of hair. His nose was beautifully straight. I leaned more of my weight onto the text book. My mind was racing. Coming up blank. This guy was putting out some kind of pheromone - the kind that made me stupid. His shirt read ‘On Through The Night – Def Leppard Concert Tour Staff’.

VOL 6, ISSUE 2

“This is not my day,” I said. Of course, my damn cell phone battery was dead. Shit. I couldn’t sit on him forever. He grinned, showing a delightful array of gum gaps and one shiny silverlooking amalgam filling. I was not amused. "I'm Billy Joe. Everyone calls me B.J." "I don’t care if everyone calls you P.B. and J. … or B.L.T.” I should run now while I have the chance. I slammed my butt into his stomach. It didn’t do anything except make me feel better. I considered punching him. I’d never straight out punched someone. I slowly removed the book. He rubbed his neck for a second. I gave him a sheepish, disarming smile. Then I bashed my head into his nose. I mean, it had been too perfect, right? It made a horrible shattering noise. His nose started gushing blood. Did it break? I bet it broke. Oh, dang. “Gugh. What did you do that for? I’m bleeding, aren’t I? I am. I’m bleeding. You’ve ruined my T-shirt. I worked hard to get this shirt. It’s ruined. You ruined it.” The next thing I knew he pinned me under him and had a cloth over my mouth and nose before I even saw him move. SHIT! Where the hell did that come from? Damn. Damn. Damn. Damn. I kneed him, trying for his balls. He didn’t even flinch. How can anyone be so heavy? I lost strength fast. I struggled… hard! The world went brown. The library building seemed miles away. I should have known to go home right after school on a day when Petey the Pee-er peed in his pants. Then I blacked out. Chapter 2 Consciousness slammed into me. Then nausea. I willed myself not to groan. My body felt like a bag of rotted vegetables. Okay, Susan, whatever you did to feel this way? Don’t do it again. I opened my eyes a hair’s width. "I apologize for your mode of arrival." Oh my god, that voice could give a girl orgasms just by reading the phone book. Move closer whoever you are. “I feel like crap,” I said. My tongue was swollen and fuzzy. “I’m sorry.” Oh, that voice. "Not sorry enough," I growled. I lifted my head, which sent the room spinning for a second, to look at who owned that voice. My jaw dropped. "God damn, you're gorgeous." I hadn’t meant to say it out loud. He’s not that good looking. I took a deep breath. He’s not. He walked toward me with the grace of an athlete. My mouth hung open. He was tall and his skin was the shade of golden you can only get if you’re part African. His hair was brown with a tinge of red, but it was his green eyes that caught my attention. Not green like I had ever seen or heard of, but an amazing dark green that reminded me of the forests in fairy tales. Incredibly gorgeous. Maybe I’m dreaming. Yep, that’s it. I’m dreaming. I remember I was job-hunting in the library. If I were dreaming my head wouldn’t be pounding. My heart wouldn’t be either. His shirt was semi-transparent gold material that showed off a muscular, broad, hairless chest. He was wearing cream-colored leather pants. The soft, second-skin type. “Nice outfit." I said with more sarcasm than I thought I’d be able to muster. “It’s supposed to be appealing.” “You can’t appeal to me right now because chloroforming me is at the top of my how-to-piss-me-off list.” “I’m sorry. This location had to stay secret and there’s something

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important I need to discuss with you and only you.” “I’m guessing you were a drama major,” I said. His head moved back on his neck. “You needed to see me? Me? You could have just called. I’m in the phone book. Or sent an invitation? ‘Dear Susan, your presence is requested at a kidnapping, your own. Please dress appropriately.’ ” His mouth tilted up in the corner. It was what I assumed was the smile of the decadently wicked. He walked with a sway that made mouth water. I bet he has a great ass, too. “Back up, Tonto,” I said. The difference between the two warring voices that my instincts were screaming and the third brazen voice that was actually coming out of my mouth was so jarring that I was surprised that he couldn’t hear the beat of my heart from the distance between us. His chin had a tiny cleft in it and I wanted to lean forward and lick it. I blushed. I tried to think of something repugnant. Old nuns, sewer systems, filibusters. I stood up, slowly. Very slowly. I pictured myself running my hands down his back while kissing that magnificent chest. He was so delectable I had to concentrate to stay mad. My stomach and all the places lower got hot, wet, and clenched. I’m in control here. I. Am. In. Control. My desire to jump this man’s bones does not control me. Come on Susan, snap out of it! I stared right at him and tried to look bored. "I'm a vampire. You shouldn't be able to look me right in the eyes." “Hah! I’m glad you can be light-hearted,” I said and laughed. “It breaks up the tension.” "My apologies for not introducing myself properly." He took a step back, and then made a deep bow, bending at the waist. "I'm Moishe Oglemar Markowitz.” "Moishe? Moy-sheh?” I laughed. He turned, walked to a large antique throne-like chair, on a platform. “Please call me Mark. Everyone calls me Mark.” “I’ll bet they do.” I took a step towards the door. "Well, Count Delusional, it’s been a pleasure, I mean, an experience. Now that I’ve gotten my chance to see how loony you are, I feel complete. I’m outta here.” “Please, Ms. Saston, I need to talk to you.” “I’m Count Dracula and I’m coo-coo,” I said circled my finger near my temple as I backed up slowly towards the door. “Coo-coo for coca-puffs.” “Please, don’t be frightened. I’m not crazy. I need to talk to you." “You have 10 seconds. Talk fast. I’ve had a long day. I'm tired and hungry. I’m really pissed off. I missed lunch, and now dinner. You’re making me cranky." "I'm sorry, I haven’t offered you anything yet." Mark looked towards the closed door and suddenly Billy Joe opened it from the other side. How did he get him to do that? "B.J. The lady missed lunch." "Oh, of course." Billy Joe looked at me. "Do you eat meat?" I nodded, confused. B.J. closed the door behind him. I looked at Mark. “What does that have to do with anything? Wait, did I just agree to stay for dinner?” "Please, be my guest," Mark said. He was doing something extra with his voice. Not hypnotism exactly, but something. "Do you pitch your voice like that on purpose?" He sighed. "Yes." "Well, it doesn't work with me, so can it." "Please.” His voice was a little less mesmerizing this time but not much. “Okay, it does work on me.” He laughed that time, a real belly laugh. “Please stay.” He asked. I wanted to stay with him for a long, long time, but I wanted a choice about it. I wanted dinner and then him for dessert. “No,” I said, more to myself than to him. “No,” I said more firmly. My stomach growled loudly. Ugh. How embarrassing. I could see his lips twist as he tried not to smile. “Why couldn’t you have been the one to kidnap me? You could have

said, ‘Why, hello, follow me,’ and I would have followed, leaving a long trail of drool. You had your chance. You blew it. Adios, crazy Count Chocula.” I turned, ran to the door, and wrenched it open. "You’ve heard about the disappearances. They are murders." Even how he said ‘murders’ was slow and enticing. “Everyone’s heard. I'm hoping they are still alive." "Twenty-four children missing and I assure you, they are dead." My purse fell. "Twenty-four?” I shook my head. “Don’t be ridiculous. No. How can that be? The news only reported three." "The three children reported missing were white.” My gums began to sour. The shock was like hitting a brick wall. I believed him. This was Savannah, Georgia, progressive, yet oldfashioned. "Tell me you are kidding." "I am not. Someone is eating them." Chapter 3 My stomach launched into my throat. “I’m going to throw up,” I said. My legs suddenly buckled. Mark was by my side, fast. My legs caught me at the last minute, so I ended up in a low squat holding the edge of the door for support. Mark crouched down near me and waved a hand near my side. Magically, my stomach calmed. Warm reservoirs of tears floated across my vision. Mark was silent while I wept. He didn't make any big overtures. My sniffles echoed in the big chamber. I concentrated on my breath, going in and out. “Come on, my darling.” He helped me stand. Billy Joe came in carrying a table and chair. Another guy came in behind him carrying a large tray. Jeesh, was he hot too? I wiped my hand across the bottom of my nose. If Mark thought the change from shriveling bowl of Jell-O to normal human being was weird, he didn’t show it. I caught an eyeful of the new guy. He had that surfer meets sensitivegeek look. Yup, hot. His glasses fogged up with the steam rising from the food. My stomach growled like a freight train. "Susan," Mark said, "This is Leo." I looked from B.J. to Leo to Mark. I wanted them all, badly. I was a sensual person but this was ridiculous. I looked up towards the vents in the ceiling, wondering if they were pumping some clever sex drug into the air. Billy Joe placed the table and chair in front of me and Leo began to unload the dishes. "Chicken soup!" The cure for half the world’s problems. The other half needs chocolate. Everything was going to be alright. Billy Joe and Leo left. I was kind of bummed. Mark returned to the throne. Danger, Will Robinson. Beware of egomaniacs with a penchant for goldleaf. If he has a crown somewhere, I’m screaming bloody murder. "Aren't you going to have some?" I asked. "I can’t. Besides, nothing matters to me now but stopping this monster. These killings have gone on long enough.” He banged his fist on the arm of the chair. “I won’t tolerate it.” “Do you know any of the victims or their families?” I asked. “No.” He paused. “But I know there’s a vampire behind this.” “Enough with the vampire shit, it’s getting old.” “It’s just a term for the disease - don’t let it distract you. We don’t engage in the nonsense myths portray. I am not a bat. The point is my instincts tell me...” He stopped. “What?” “That I know the murderer.” “Hmm,” I said. “What, hmm?” “Well, statistics say that most murder victims are murdered by someone (cont’d on p 29 )

TOUGH LIT. II

AFTAW SPECIAL

The Eternal Nocturne, Pt 2 This freaky fantasy was featured in our Fall issue. Here’s the recap: After meeting the hypnotic stranger Belial, Analise discovered the dark and thrilling world of the Eternals. She jumped at the chance to become one of the Eternals, intoxicated by their beauty. However, in order to truly become an Eternal, Analise was forced to prove her devotion by making the ultimate betrayal; murder. Belial kidnapped her husband, Garrett, and put the knife in her hand. Desire and devotion battled inside her, and for the first time, she realized the horrors of the dark road she had impetuously chosen to travel. Rather than kill her loving husband, Analise made the decision to attack her husband's kidnappers, allowing him to escape. By saving his life, has she condemned her own? * * * They had come to a stone tower that seemed long abandoned. Perhaps once it had been part of some minor castle, but the wrath of time had left only the tower and a few of the desolate buildings around it to remain standing in lonely silence. Dorian had advised her to seek the comfort of sleep in a pile of hay that had been laid to one side of a vast chamber. She had protested that she was not tired, and that the hay might have fleas. He had only smiled at her thinly and told her that the fleas would be of no concern to her. In the end, she succumbed to his wishes and spread herself out atop the hay. Weariness fell over her like never before and she lost herself in a deep, dreamless sleep. When at last she awoke, it was to the relentless chorus of soft moans and groans, played in harmony to the unending cries of the ecstatic. Her eyes fluttered open and she looked across from her, where Belial laid with the two night women in a second pile of hay at the other end of the chamber. Their bodies stripped of clothing, their limbs were all intertwined in some erotic tangle of cold skin against cold skin. Analise could not help but stare, watching in morbid confusion while trying to discern what was happening. The golden-haired girl, her face once more whole and gorgeous, had her mouth on Belial’s neck, her tongue and teeth caressing the tender flesh. Blood leaked from her probing tongue, painting the man’s throat red with crimson fluid. Despite herself, Analise felt a sudden temptation stir within her as she watched this gruesome lovemaking. Across from her, the raven-haired girl, sitting on her hands and knees, fixed her gaze upon Analise. The night woman smiled and gestured with the forefinger of one hand to beckon her towards them. Analise shuddered and quickly ran for the door. Before her was a flight of stairs, which she ascended with all haste to be away from the wicked threesome. She soon found herself out on the open rooftop of the tower. The air was cool and refreshing, the wind gentle and faint. Delicate flakes of snow fell from the heavens above, sprinkling the surrounding earth in a white blanket of frost and ice. Swallowing lightly in an attempt to give moisture to the arid desert her throat had become, she moved to the weathered ramparts across from her. Her eyes instinctively stared off in the direction they had come from, the direction back to Suttonsville… back to Garrett. A movement from her left caught her attention and she turned to see Dorian sitting atop one of the higher parapets. He was shrouded within the dark folds of a cloak this time, the fabric dancing lazily in the night’s breeze as he sat with one knee bent upwards to serve as an armrest. If he had sensed her presence, he made no effort to acknowledge it. Instead, he remained seated in silence, staring off into the opposite horizon. Curious, she followed his gaze. Far in the distance, she could see a mass of clouds and the pale flash of lightning as a storm raged over the land. Her eyes again wandered back up to him, watching as snowflakes fell upon his soft locks of dark hair. “Are you not cold?” she murmured quietly into the evening silence. Without turning to look at her, as though already aware that he was no

VOL 6, ISSUE 2

by Faraz Gafoor

longer alone, he merely whispered in reply, “Are you?” “Terribly,” Analise confessed with an involuntary shiver, her arms wrapping around herself. The silence resumed its easy reign over them, and she found herself again following his gaze to the distant horizon. “What is it that you are looking at?” she finally dared to question. “The same thing you were only a moment ago,” he answered faintly. Home? Analise felt a familiar sorrow blossom within her chest, and she returned her eyes to the direction of the home that the gods had taken from her. “I am sorry for what has befallen you.” The sudden whisper of Dorian’s voice startled her, and she looked up to see him still staring at the storm in the midnight horizon. She put a hand on the eroded rampart and sighed quietly. “What has befallen me? What are we?” At long last he spared her a glance from those chilly blue eyes of his, his eerily beautiful face partially veiled by wisps of windblown hair. “We are the Eternal,” he murmured in somber explanation, “the ageless reflection of humanity’s inherent depravity.” Humanity’s inherent depravity. His words brought to her mind the fire of terrible memory, of her shame and betrayal. “I miss Garrett,” she said abruptly. “I want to go to him, to at least see if he is all right…” And to tell him that I am sorry…so dreadfully sorry. “If you go to him now, it will be more out a yearning for companionship than a testimony of your love for him,” Dorian softly replied. He turned to her and she saw within the pale azure of his eyes a peculiar glint of compassion. “But I do love him,” she argued. Her fingers gripped at the stone of the rampart and she felt part of it crumble to dust within her grasp. Dorian slid down from his seat to smoothly land beside her. “And that is why you should keep away,” he said. She had been about to argue again, to offer another bout of defiance, but something in his expression gave her pause. She could see within his eyes a faint touch of…of what? Sorrow? Regret? “You feel that you are alone now,” he murmured with his eyes again glancing at the faraway storm. “And in your misery, you yearn for company, for someone to share the agonizing burden with. You think that having someone near will lessen the weight of your fears and will ease the pain of longing. But the more we drag others down into the misery of our morbid existence only increases the tragedy we have found ourselves consumed by.” A smile settled along his lips, cold and cynical, sad and mocking all at once. “I thought I had learned and mastered this lesson when I left my kingdom of Panerka to begin my self-exile all those years ago. But the misery of loneliness is not one easily conquered, as delineated by the unfortunate existence of our companions below.” His eyes met hers and the cynicism was replaced by what appeared to be genuine sorrow. “If not for me and my own yearning, these scions of mine would not be, and never would the agony of the Eternal have intervened with the affairs of your life. For that reason, I am truly sorry…for I am acquainted all too well with the pain of loss.” She listened to his every word, absorbed his every nuance in expression. “Panerka, the City of the Dead,” she muttered. She had heard the city’s name in stories from her childhood. The tales said it had once been a great, glamorous city full of riches and wealth, the envy of the world. Then, mysteriously, it had fallen from grace, its populace turned into monstrous reflections of the people they once were, all in the servitude of a fearsome lord of monsters who had usurped the throne and spread his undead army into the neighboring realms. Realization dawned on her and she stared at the man before her with shock and awe lighting her eyes. “You …you are the demon lord, the monster king of Panerka.” He said nothing, but the cool silence in his face was confirmation enough. She shook her head in confusion, scowling at

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the thought of fantasy becoming reality. “But it was said that you died… after King Solon of Halospear defeated you and repelled your army from his borders.” A smile split his lips. It was a chilling sight, something entirely devoid of mirth and warmth. Still he kept his eyes away from hers, off to the horizon, yet she could see the amusement dancing within the sapphire depths. “Humans,” he said, speaking the word as though the creatures of reference were worthy of scorn, or distaste at the very least, “their brains would explode should they cease to simplify history’s intricate complexities.” He shifted his gaze unto hers. “King Solon was at my mercy,” he calmly explained. “I had him alone in one of the chambers of his great palace, and his life could have ended at my hands. Yet I did not kill him.” Though his eyes remained on her, she could see that he was looking back through the ages, deep into the elaborate recesses of his memory. “I offered him life, so long as our war could at last reach its end. There were to be no campaigns against the Dead City or the territories I had conquered for my people. The Kingdom of Panerka would remain as it had become without further expansion.” His focus returned to the present, the intensity in his eyes something sad and tragic to behold. “You see, Analise, it was a dream of mine to create from the disaster of my people a home within which we could have at last the paradise we were deprived of in life. It was a dream I had kept with me since before the time of my own descent into this unholy darkness. And King Solon, faced with the option of this arrangement or certain death, chose to accept my offer of peace…chose to help me see my dream come true.” She watched as his smile returned, cold and thin. “Just as we had reached our accord, a wizard in his service entered the chamber and began the chant to the spell that would mean my demise.” He turned away from her, his eyes moving up to the starlit heavens and the descending flakes of snow. “This wizard had been experimenting with the magical energies in his command to find a suitable combination of the powers that would prove effective against my kind during the war. He had arrived at an incantation more painful and far more deadly than any other spell emulating nature’s anger against our kind. “It is the living world around us, you see, that detests our abnormal existence to a level that surpasses mortal comprehension. Everything enjoyed in life is a pain to us now. This wizard understood our agony and wrought with his magic a great burst of energy capable of reflecting the seething fury of the daylight sun. He told this to his king just as he had begun the conjuring of his power.” Analise found herself again clinging to Dorian’s words, hanging in suspense for the conclusion to this retelling of the myth she had grown up with. To her surprise, Dorian’s next smile appeared genuine, something lacking the chilling coolness of former smiles. “The king stopped him. He had me at his mercy, could have killed me and forever ended the threat posed by my wretched people of Panerka. But he was a man so unlike others of his kind. Oh, there dwelt the lure of temptation within him, that I do not doubt. But nobility to him was something more than a social status as it had been for the aristocracy of the living Panerka. It was something born of honor and duty. And so, against the urging of his wizard, the king permitted me to take my leave.” He paused and seemed again lost in the fog of memory. “He trusted me to honor our agreement when he could have killed me and worry not for the slippery thing that is trust.” “And you put yourself into exile from Panerka,” Analise quietly finished. “The kindness of King Solon reminded me of how, even if rarely, humanity can glow when engulfed by the shade of despair. There is, however, no such glow found in those who have become my people,” he added with the weight of the world seeming to again descend upon his slender shoulders. “I have lost just as you have lost, though the suffering conclusion of my life was delivered by the corruption and wickedness of living humans. You see, Analise, the end of my life was caused not by the depravity of the dead, but by the depravity of the living nobles of Panerka

who, in their ambition for power, plotted against my family. “When I was brought back from the blankets of death’s bed, it was to honor the dream I had when alive, to rule the kingdom that was by right mine. I shared that dream with those I had taken with me, and I meant for it to become the dream of us all. Panerka, City of the Dead, would have stood as a united empire expanding into the remaining realms of man and expelling from the world his hypocrisy and depravity. We were, in essence, the true core of man and humanity. We were humanity’s sinful secrets; our insatiable lust a reflection of man’s unending desire, our hunger for life a metaphor for man’s gradual destruction of his world.” Analise stared at him, captivated by the sheer intensity with which he spoke, the soft, powerful emotion conveyed in each single word he uttered. I have come to stand before a god among mortals…a dream in this nightmare that has become my life. “Panerka was my dream,” he quietly finished. “But I learned all too late that the dead no longer dream. The creature we humans become when taken from the sun’s grace, lost to the banal cravings of our core nature, is something I realized would never glow in the same way that King Solon proved humans who still enjoyed the breath of life could. “There is no dreaming for the dead. There is only suffering, only the hunger for others to suffer alongside you. In this we become what the sun hides from humanity’s living eye—the inherent demon lurking within us all, the terrible truth that we are the destroyers of our very own worlds.” He shook his head suddenly, as if in disappointment of all that had happened those many years ago, and in sympathy for what had transpired just the previous night. “For this, and for so many other reasons, I am sorry that you now share the eternal fate of the damned.” “But I don’t want to be like this!” she said with desperation starting to rise within her, panic and despair welling within her eyes. “I want to go home.” “We all want to go home, dear Analise,” was his gentle answer, “but all we can do is either accept what we have become and embrace the nightfall of our nature, or…” She took a step towards him, anxious for him to complete his offering of a choice, of an escape from this terrible existence apart from life. “Or?” He turned away, glancing again at the faraway horizon and the gathering storm clouds. “Or we could fight to cling to what made us human…fight against time to keep ourselves from forgetting.” “From forgetting what?” she asked, feeling that salvation clung to this pivotal answer. “From forgetting how to dream,” he murmured while deliberately looking into her yearning eyes. But before she could respond, he walked on ahead, straight past the ramparts and off the tower’s very edge. She ran to the ledge, watching as his cloak flapped in the air while his feet soundlessly settled upon the snowy earth below. Analise hesitated for but a single moment, and then she leapt after him. * * * He stood in the rain, the storm’s winds howling around him. Across from him loomed a small, seemingly abandoned fortress. The cruelty of the years and the southern seasons had deformed the ancient keep into something reflective of children’s tales of ghosts and ghouls. But Desrik was unperturbed by the haunted appearance. The object of his desire was lurking within—that desire being vengeance. Neither rain nor shadow would obstruct his course towards that end. He started towards the fortress, his eyes examining its jagged, unkempt surface from within the drenched fabric of his hood. The large pair of doors directly across from him would lead into the foyer, but he had no way of ramming the doors in, and so he carefully studied the walls. The wind intensified into a wild banshee cry, pushing the storm’s downpour at an angle and striking through the folds of his purple cloak. A whinny from behind drew his attention back to his horse. The white beast had served him loyally, and only now, under weight of the dread looming before them, did it show any sign of protest. He walked towards the faithful creature, giving it a gentle slap along the flank. “Go, Leala,” he murmured. “Be safe, old friend.” (cont’d on p 36 )

TOUGH LIT. II

AFTAW SPECIAL

Literary Symbiosis

by Jessa S Joehnk

She gasped in happy surprise, her fingers lightly brushing the beautiful ruby pendant in its velvet black background. The stone, as dark as blood, was the size of her pinky nail and almost perfectly round. Silver was woven ornately around the stone, flashing in the candlelight of their table. “Oh, darling, it’s beautiful!” she murmured, unable to take her eyes from it. “In honor of your publication, my dear.” He offered the black velvet box to her and, with timid fingers she took it. With her holding the box, he carefully removed the necklace, the chain dragging out. “Do you want to...” She nodded, her eyes watching the small pendant swinging between them. Leaning forward, she was careful not to get her long brunette hair in the flame as he hung the necklace carefully around her neck, the pendant dropping into place just above her cleavage when she settled back. She continued to brush it with her fingertips as it dangled there. “It’s amazing, Arthur. But why now? This is the fourth book I’ve published. Why not the third or the fifth?” “Nobody celebrates the fourth,” he said with a grin. “So, in order to break from the cliché, I saved it specifically for this one. And I have to say, it’s stunning on you, my dear.” She felt a small blush rise in her cheeks as she glanced down, her eyes catching the flame on the table and holding them there. “You’re sweet, Arthur. But when do we get to celebrate your publication?” It was the same question she’d asked of him three previous times, each time with the same answer– “Soon enough. I just need to get over this bout of writer’s block.” She sighed and settled back at the familiar answer. It was a ritual that, although not as happy as it could be, was one she was comfortable with by now. In the beginning, it had upset her. She’d wanted him to take it as seriously as she did, but then she realized that he was too busy with his real job. With a smile, she held up her glass of red wine (his choice) and started. “To the best literary agent in the world.” He held up his own glass and bumped it against hers with a clink that managed to be audible over the murmurs of the restaurant. “To an author who is easy to sell.” Laughing, she shook her head. “I’m sure you meant that to sound better than it does.” Sipping his wine, he gave a small nod, then turned his attention to the meal that was being delivered their way. She moved the small velvet box, closing it and slipping it into her purse, before she turned to her own meal, her stomach growling at the prospect of a plateful of ruddy red crab. Later that night, she stared at the computer screen and sighed, her attention never wavering from the lit up box. She didn’t seem to notice when Arthur slipped into the room until he began to rub her shoulders. “It’s all right, Lily, love. Your next piece isn’t due for some time, don’t stress about it.” “It’s for a fantastic anthology, though! I want to have this one perfect – they deserve nothing less.” “You say that every time.” “And I mean it every time.” She smiled and reached up to take his hand in her own. “I just don’t get it. It’s like the characters keep skipping out of my reach! I just can’t quite slip into it.” He took his hand back and rubbed her shoulders with a little more effort this time, actually finding a kink in her neck. She relaxed under his fingers, letting him work out the knot as she kept her eyes on the screen. “I’m not used to this, you know?” “Well, maybe you’re not quite past your last piece. I mean, you’re prolific, but not everyone can keep up with that level all the time. Take some time off.” “I can’t! I have deadlines to make, I have promises to keep.” “Robert Frost,” he interrupted. She glared at him in the reflection of the computer screen, though she

VOL 6, ISSUE 2

wasn’t sure if he caught it. “There’s too much to do. I can’t afford to get all wrapped up in myself right now, Arthur.” “All I’m saying is to take a few days off to yourself. Relax! Remember, the worst that happens is you disappoint someone and then make it up in the long run.” She turned to look at him, playing with the ruby pendant at her neck, the same one he’d given her only a few weeks prior. “Will I be disappointing you?” “What? No!” “I mean you, the agent, you. Not you, the husband, you.” “Still no. You cannot possibly disappoint with how well your third book is doing on the shelves. And with the fourth out soon enough, I promise to be thrilled with you for years to come. If not decades!” “Well, when are you going to get one done so I can be proud of you?” He hesitated before smiling shyly. “Well, apparently your misfortune is my gain. I’ve been working on it the last few nights, after you went to bed. I’ve gotten another three chapters done.” She jumped up and threw her arms around his neck, kissing him. “Oh, Arthur, that’s fantastic!” She kissed him again, hard on the lips. “I can’t believe it. Doubling your word count in a matter of days! Maybe my Muse has jumped ship for a bit and gone to run your sails.” “I think she’s in the crow’s nest, actually, yelling directions down to me. I’ve never had this piece so clear before. I know exactly where things are going.” “Oh, Arthur, that’s amazing. I’m so proud.” She kissed him one more time before pulling away. She readjusted her necklace – probably the hundredth time that day alone – and sat back down carefully. “We’ll celebrate tonight, darling. Until then, though, I’m afraid I’ll have to retreat back into the world of words.” He leaned down and kissed her cheek lightly, but she was already so absorbed she didn’t look away from the screen. “That’s all right, Lily love. I have my own words to pen anyway.” Lily sat, her head in her hands, the dampness pooling and sticking to her cheeks and some dripping down her nose. She took a deep breath when she heard Arthur enter the room and bit back the urge to sniffle, hastily wiping away as many of the tears as she could. She sat up straight and tried to act as though there was nothing wrong. He must have noticed immediately, for she was swiveled around in her chair and enveloped in a hug. “Darling, don’t stress so!” She let the tears flow again, unable to hold them in even for a moment. “It’s just that... three pages in four weeks? That’s ridiculous!” “You have other things on your mind,” he said with a soothing tone. “It’s not your fault you’re going through a slump–it happens to all of us!” Her fingers dragged at the pendant, twisting it around on the chain, spinning it so the chain twisted up and spiraled down as it unwound. “It’s not supposed to happen to me, though, Arthur. I’m supposed to be able to overcome this whenever I want.” “You wouldn’t be a real author if you didn’t have the occasional bout of writer’s block,” he teased, resting his palm against her damp cheek. He rubbed a stream of tears away with his thumb before kissing her forehead. “This too shall pass.” “Okay Go.” “The Bible!” She smiled, her face brightening a bit. “I suppose, if you want to get medieval about a quote.” “I’ll show you medieval...” He dragged her up onto her feet and took her out of the office, leading her down the hall and into their bedroom with a wicked glint in his eye. She lay in the bed, not willing to get up and not entirely sure she could if she wanted. She kept her eyes closed, trying to pretend sleeping in, though she knew her ruse could only work for so long and only if Arthur were willing to play along as well. He brushed the hair out of her face and kissed her cheek, apparently

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refusing to follow along. “Come on, darling. You stayed in bed yesterday.” “I got up for dinner,” she mumbled, her eyes still shut. “And then went promptly back to bed. You haven’t even sat at the computer in a week and a half!” “I can’t. I can’t bear it, Arthur! Empty screen, that’s all I see anymore. It’s so disappointing...” “So write something!” “You sound like I did four months ago.” He sighed and settled down onto the bed beside her, staring into her eyes. She searched his brown ones for any indication of him letting her rest her day away again, but was prodded lightly in the side for her efforts. “You have to eventually do something, Lily love.” “I am. I’m catching up on a lifetime of missed rest.” “You rest fine.” “Not when I’m writing. You know I only get a few hours a night, if that.” He rubbed her arm, a reassuring feeling. “I suppose. Just rest here, then, and don’t worry about your novel or short stories, and especially not your deadlines.” “You’re an ass.” “I know, but an ass that you love.” He leaned forward and kissed her gently on the forehead before swinging off the bed, almost immediately from laying down to standing up. “Come on. Try to get a little work done. I think you might actually get something done today.” “Are you sure it’s not yourself in that case, Arthur? You’ve managed how many pages in the last few weeks?” He didn’t turn towards her, heading out of the bedroom as he commented over his shoulder. “It’s not quantity that matters.” “How many?” she called out, though she had a vague idea. “Twelve chapters, okay?” He peeked back into the room. “But that’s also a fluke and you know it. You also know that I’ve been working on this piece for five years now. It’s about time I managed to get somewhere with it.” She slowly sat up, her small silver and ruby pendant settling right above her barely-there tank top, the small spiral of silver woven around the ruby catching her eye for a split second before she stood up, yawning deeply. “I’m just so tired...” “Get two pages written, and I’ll let you sleep for twenty-four hours straight if inspiration leads you to it.” With that, he disappeared from the doorway, heading somewhere unknown. She stretched out her limbs and headed down the hallway to where her office was. She didn’t see him at all during the trek, though much later found him in the kitchen cooking dinner. She spun the silver chain through the pendant and sighed. “Two pages ...” She stared at the empty document on her computer screen, too tired to look away, too depressed to do anything about it, and too unfocused to accomplish anything at all. The blank screen, the glaring white empty document, was the beginning, yet also the end. Her short story was three days late, and she’d hoped to have at least the first draft finished by now. With a yawn, she slowly dragged her aching, sluggish limbs into some semblance of order so she could stand up. She teetered on her feet for a second, pain in her toes and arches as she actually made them work for the first time in hours. She forced her knees and thighs to respond to her prompts, shuffling across the floor with her eyes only on the door a few feet away. Once she made it there, she took in a labored breath, shocked at how tired she already felt. She knew it had been a while since she worked out, but she didn’t think it’d lead to her feeling this run down. With a yawn she tried to bite back, she made it into the hallway and down it a bit. She glanced into the kitchen and, finding it empty and no food on the stove, she started down the hall farther, looking at the bathroom (empty), the bedroom (empty), and the living room before she realized he was probably in his own office–a tiny affair they’d made from an unused closet. He’d been insistent that she should have the real office and that he was fine with the small, cozy space. He’d told her that she was the one that was going to spend hours a day in the office, so she ought to get the nice one. He’d been nice too–her office had a view, nice furniture, and whenever she

needed (or more likely, wanted) something new for her office, he’d gladly gotten it for her. She easily pushed opened the door to Arthur’s office, the door swinging silently open. She reached up and fiddled with her necklace as she stared at him, writing feverishly at his computer. Her thumb rubbed the stone of the pendant as she continued to watch him for several minutes. He was typing away like a madman on a mission, something she remembered vaguely, though it now seemed a lifetime before. She stepped forward, about to touch his shoulder, when she heard him murmuring. He was murmuring it over and over again, a small, cruel grin plastered on his face. “A novel almost finished. Only a precious few more hours of this, Lily my love. Only a few more hours of me borrowing your Muse.” He brushed something around his neck – a necklace she’d never seen before. It was almost identical to her own pendant, though instead of silver and ruby, it was a single light blue sapphire set in gold, the look unusual and in direct contrast to hers. She gasped and stumbled back, a stabbing feeling hitting her heart. “What are you?” she couldn’t manage to drag the rest of the words out of her mouth, her breath coming too quick and shallow. She’d meant to ask what he was doing, though the three words that she spat out seemed oddly more appropriate. He turned to her, one eyebrow raised, his lips still smiling in a slightly cruel way. “You just have a little longer to wait, my dear. Hold out for just a few more hours and I will be finished.” “I can’t...” Feeling the beginnings of darkness touch the sides of her vision, she tried desperately to drag air into her lungs, “I won’t...” Hitting the wall when she reeled back, she managed to knock what air was left out of her lungs. The stabbing feeling continued, her left arm tingling uncomfortably as she slid down the wall into a heap at the bottom. She tried so hard to breathe, but felt like her ribcage was falling in on itself. She reached up as if to check to make sure that exact thing wasn’t happening. She saw him turn back to the computer right before darkness took over the rest of her vision. With one final gasp of air, one final drag of the thing she’d never realized tasted so sweetly on her tongue, she grabbed a hold of the small silver chain and pulled hard, feeling it give way, the pendant dropping from around her neck to the carpeted floor below. Jessa S. Joehnk draws her inspiration from her surrounding community in Alaska. Although transplanted up when she was young, she has flourished in the Matanuska-Susitna soils and has found a voice of her own through the rough winters. She froze at the University of Fairbanks, but holds dual BAs in English and Theatre for her pains. Her winters find her at home with family, who keep her so occupied with theatre projects that she doesn't notice it's winter outside. Yet she still looks forward to her summers spent working on her MA in English through Middlebury’s Bread Loaf School of English, even if it pulls her away from the wonderful, warm days spent under the midnight sun. Grey Goose (cont’d from p 7) My wife tucks her camera carefully into the pocket of her windbreaker, and gives it a pat. “I think,” she says, “that we had better call 911.” I gaze across the water to where the sinking sun is painting the sky like a bruise. Ninety years old is a good, long life for anyone, I think. Beside me, my brother-in-law blubbers senselessly, reeking of pineapple. Over the bay, the gulls are wheeling, shrieking and scolding, already beginning to take an interest in the new thing lying on the rocks below.

TOUGH LIT. II

Carre Gardner is a registered nurse and freelance writer. She lives in southern Russia with her husband, three children and dog Kopek. When she is in the States, her home is the Portland, Maine area. Her story Code appeared in our first TOUGH LIT issue last September. We’re proud to feature her again this issue.

AFTAW SPECIAL

Party Time!

by PJ Hawkinson

Hot! So hot! Sweat dripped off my face and trickled between my breasts. Where are they! My eyes probe the darkness. Where are they? A light at the corner is giving off a little illumination but it isn’t enough to reach into the gloom where I’m crouched. Where are they? A sound to my left, very small, barely discernible over the distant city sounds. Is that them? I shrink down into the shadows. There’s nowhere to hide. I scan the area, looking for the cause of the sound. Nothing! Too dark! Tears mix with the sweat and burn my eyes. Why is this happening? How did I get into this? Five hours earlier… “Mel,” my younger sister barged into my room. “Did you knock?” I asked pointedly. Callie is a year younger than me, seventeen to my eighteen. I’m no stick in the mud, but Callie? Callie is the rose in our family’s garden while I’m the daisy. She is easily outgoing, drawing people to her like bees to a rose garden. I’m totally the opposite; I have to work hard to make friends. “Sorry,” Callie backed out of the room, pulling the door closed behind her. She knocked loudly. I sighed. “Come in.” Callie’s eyes roam over my room. She manages to contain the sneer as she looks over the posters on my walls. Her walls are covered with rock band posters and current hot actors; mine are plastered with kick boxing posters. Boxing gloves hang from my dresser mirror. Dragging her attention back to me, Callie began again, “Mel, Tina just called and she knows where there’s a party tonight.” “And that’s new how?” I ask. Callie’s friend always knows where there’s party. Callie laughed, “Well, anyway, she wants me to go, and I want you to go.” “Uh, hunh,” I nod. “In other words, you guys need a driver.” “Don’t be that way,” Callie soothed. “We want you to come. Not just for your car. Come on Melody, please.” “I don’t think so,” I said, registering Callie’s disappointment. “I have to study for the final in trig this weekend if I’m going to get a passing grade.” “Mel! Come on! You can study tomorrow." “No!” I said flatly, holding the door for her. “Go!” Callie stormed from my room. I heard her door slam down the hall, and then silence. I dragged out everything I’d need to study and tossed it on my desk. Looking around, I added pencil and paper, turned on my desktop lamp, and started to sit but stopped. I left the room, headed for the kitchen to get a soda. As I passed, I could hear sobbing coming from behind Callie’s closed door. I sighed. Callie, though extremely popular, had just suffered the break-up of her and her long-time boyfriend. They had been going steady for four years, during which time Callie had retained her sexual innocence. Then, boys being boys, Bane had started pushing Callie to do things she wasn’t willing to do; finally, she broke up with him. It had been a month and Bane was not trying to get Callie back. She was brokenhearted. Looking at the door, I hesitated. Callie and I didn’t get along well. Being totally different, we were constantly rubbing each other the wrong way. Callie could use some fun, I thought. At last I knocked. “Go away,” she said. “Okay. But if you’re not ready when I leave, then I’m going to the party with Tina and you can stay home.” I turned and started down the hallway. I made it three steps before Callie’s door opened and she rushed into the hall. She threw her arms around me from behind, gave me a bear-hug, and headed back to her room. Over her shoulder she announced, “You’re the best sister ever.” I shook my head as I reentered my room. Now I’m the best. Now that

VOL 6, ISSUE 2

I’m giving in. But usually I don’t get that title. Usually I’m the reason for Callie’s disappointments. I stopped being critical and started flipping through the clothes in my closet. “Where is the party?” I hollered. From down the hall, “I’m not sure. Somebody’s house, I think.” Okay. That means casual. I grabbed a pair of jeans and a raggedy red T shirt with a black stick figure kick boxer above the thin black words, ‘Kick It’. I ran a brush through my shoulder length, dishwater blond hair and left it hanging free. I slipped on tennis shoes and went to Callie’s door. I knocked and waited for permission to enter. “Aren’t you ready?” I asked. Callie turned and looked at me, “Is that what you’re wearing?” She looked at my ensemble with scorn. “I don’t have to go,” I said, turning to leave. “No,” Callie said quickly. “It’s okay, I guess. Whatever you’re comfortable in.” Callie was wearing a pair of skillfully torn jeans; ones she had paid a hundred bucks for. Now she pulled on a tight t-shirt with some kind of Mexican design done in brown metallic. She added a pair of sandals. Her platinum blond hair was pulled back in a ponytail and held in place with a ribbon, and her make-up was done to perfection. She looked gorgeous, as usual. I shook my head in awe over the way she managed to make everything she wore look good. “Let’s go get Tina.” After picking up Tina and stopping for a six-pack of soda, we headed for the party. Tina’s directions led us to the edge of town and into an area where the houses were few and far between. Most of the ones still standing appeared to be abandoned. “Are you sure this is the right street?” I asked skeptically. “I’m sure,” Tina stated firmly. “Gregg said the address was 16202.” She squinted into the darkness, “This one is 16555; it should be a couple blocks yet.” Finding the right address, we pulled up to the curb. Loud music was blasting from the open windows and doors. Several cars were parked out front. “This must be it,” I stated the obvious. I peered unhappily at the house, “The place is a dump. Who did you say told you about the party?” I asked, with a trace of concern. “Gregg,” Tina said. “Who’s Gregg?” “Oh, a guy I met at the Stop-and-Go,” Tina commented nonchalantly. “You don’t even know the guy?” “He’s so cute,” Tina giggled. “I don’t know,” I started to say but Callie and Tina opened the doors and got out. I hurried to catch up with them as they cut across the grassless yard to the front door. Through the screen I could see people dancing and just hanging out. At least the music was good. Callie walked in without knocking; just like home, I thought. “Well, well, well,” a man’s voice said. “Who do we have here?” “Hey,” said a second man’s voice. “You came. Cool!” “Gregg,” Tina said as she crossed the room to stand next to him. “This is my best friend, Callie,” she didn’t introduce me. Gregg put his arm over Tina’s shoulders and pulled her close. “Umm, Callie’s a cute one, ain’t she? Who’s the other chick?” Tina looked at me and said, “Oh, that’s Mel. She drove us here.” “My sister,” Callie added. “Mel? Ain’t that a boy’s name? He transferred his gaze from Callie to me, “Are you a boy? You dress kinda like a boy.” “Whatever,” I turned to scan the room. Behind me I heard Callie say that my real name was Melody, and the guy responded with ‘whatever’. Looking around, I grew more concerned. The people here were all older than us, probably in their mid-to-late twenties. And they looked rough— mean. Several of the guys were wearing black-leather, even though it was a warm night. The girls were all skimpily dressed; tank tops and short shorts seemed to be the clothes of choice. A lot of dirty-dancing and making-out was going on. Booze and pot was being passed around openly. I wanted to leave. I turned to voice my concerns to Callie but she

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and Tina were deep in conversation with Gregg and his friend. Not wanting to seem like a nagging big sister, I decided to try to be cool, but to keep an eye open. I moved to the couch and sat on the arm, tapping my foot to the music and attempting to act nonchalant. “Hey,” a man’s voice said from the couch beside me. I turned to look and found a nice-looking guy sitting on the sofa. He had shaggy brown hair that grazed the back of his neck. A crooked smile lit up a cute face, and his big brown eyes smiled along with his mouth. He was wearing pretty much the same outfit as me, except his t-shirt was gray and didn’t feature kick boxers. “Hey,” I returned. “I’ve never seen you here,” he continued. “My names Jeff,” he stuck his hand out and I shook it. “I’m Melody,” I told him. Jeff and I turned out to have a lot in common and soon I was lost in conversation with him. I hadn’t noticed that the crowd had thinned out until Jeff stood. “As much as I hate to, I gotta go. I have to work tomorrow,” he told me. “Wow,” I said. “Almost everyone’s gone. We probably ought to be heading out too.” “Can I call you sometime?” I gave him my phone number, and after giving my arm a friendly squeeze Jeff went out the front door. Looking around, I noticed that Callie and Tina were dancing way too closely to a couple of guys. Gregg was standing watching with a look on his face that I didn’t like at all. He seemed to be enjoying the dance more than he should have; so were his buddies. In fact, several guys were watching, and a couple of girls. They all wore leers on their faces. I jumped up, “Time to go, Callie.” She ignored me. I went up and took hold of her arm to get her attention, “Come on Callie, it’s time to go.” The guy dancing with Callie rounded on me and gave me a shove, “Leave the little lady alone. She and I are happy right where we are.” Callie smirked at me and returned to the guys arms. I was furious, how dare he touch me. “Callie,” I said firmly. “Now!” I started to the door but one of the girls stepped in front of me. She reached out and ran her hand down one of my arms, “You don’t really want to go now, do you cutie? We’re just getting ready to really party.” She licked her lips seductively. I shuddered. “Yes, I really do want to leave.” Callie had seen this exchange and had noticed a change in the way the guy she was dancing with was holding her. He pulled her way to tight and was nuzzling her neck roughly. She tried to push away and tried for lightheartedness, “Well, you heard my sister, it’s time to go. Sorry!” “Oh, I don’t think you’re going anywhere,” the guy told her and kissed her roughly. Callie shoved the man and he slapped her. Tina stopped dancing and looked aghast at the man. Had he just hit her friend? I started across the room to go to her defense but Gregg stepped between me and Callie. “Let’s party,” he leered and grabbed for me. I dodged his arm and saw the man with Tina start to pull her into one of the back rooms. She was struggling to get away. Then Gregg grabbed me and pressed his sloppy lips to mine. Kick-boxing! I really enjoy kick-boxing. Now, I planted my foot in Gregg’s solar plexus. “Run,” I yelled. Hands reached for me, trying to get a hold, but I dodged. I saw Callie and Tina struggling to get loose from two men as I threw myself out one of the windows, busting through the rusted screen like it was crepe paper. I hit the ground, rolling with the fall and jumping to my feet. As I turned to run, I saw Tina and Callie pushed into a closet and a chair shoved under the doorknob. “Get her,” Gregg hollered, pointing to the window I had exited through. I ran! My purse was sitting on the couch and my car keys were inside; as was my cell phone. I ran! The door of the house crashed open behind me and I heard muffled

complaints as too many people tried to exit at once. Nowhere to hide. The houses around here were unsafe to enter, even if I were brave enough to go in one. Bushes and cars were going to be the first places they searched. I crouched into open darkness and tried to make myself small. I needed to get my sister and her friend out of that house. Voices called tauntingly, “Come out, little mouse. Come play.” Other voices held menace, “Where are you? I’m gonna make you pay for kicking me!” “Oh where, oh where, can the little girl be?” Men and women were searching. Sweat beaded up on my forehead. I was shaking so hard I was surprised they couldn’t feel the ground move. Suddenly, Gregg’s voice rose above the calls, “Okay, everyone be quiet. I can’t hear. If we shut up, we’ll hear her.” Silence. Where are they? A shadow passed close by and I dropped flat on the ground, trying to blend in to the dark. The shadow passed on by. Where are they? I made my way slowly, ever so slowly, towards the rear of the house. I had to get my sister. I had to get Callie; and Tina. I had to get them out. A crack sounded nearby. I froze. I tried to pierce the darkness with my eyes. Nothing. Where are they? Slowly, I began moving again. Soon I could see the back porch. Someone was standing there, waiting for me. Watching. I watched. I listened. “I think she’s in here,” a voice sounded from across the road and down a bit. “Hey, Gregg! I think she’s in the old Anderson place.” Many sets of feet were heard pounding in that direction and I could see people flitting through the shadows. Up on the porch, the watcher turned in the direction of the hunt. “To hell with this,” I heard a girl’s voice say. She leaped from the porch and took off to join the search. Are they all gone? Did they all go? I watched and listened for several more minutes. Finally, I crept over to the porch. Climbing cautiously up the steps, I opened the screen door and entered the silent house. No, not silent. I could hear muffled shouting and banging coming from the living room; Callie and Tina. I wanted to run to their rescue but I forced myself to move slowly, listening, looking. Finally, deciding there was no one left in the house but us, I ran for the closet. Pulling it open, I grabbed Callie and we hugged each other. “Shhhhh,” I cautioned. “Keep quiet. We have to get out of here.” Tina was crying. So was Callie. I felt tears on my own cheeks. I grabbed my purse from the couch and they grabbed theirs from the table. “Put the chair back under the door,” I told Callie. “We have to make them think you’re still in there.” Callie shoved the chair back in place and stared around frantically, “Now what?” “Now we hide.” I pulled both girls after me into the kitchen. Pulling open one door I found a pantry. The second door revealed the basement stairs. “Go!” I pointed down. Tina started to back up, “I’m not going down there. “Unh, un, no way.” “You are,” I told her, giving her a shove. “Now. Before they come back.” I was pulling my cell phone out as I pushed her towards the steps. Reluctantly, she followed Callie into the dark. Quietly, I called 911. I gave them the address and told them we were hiding in the basement. Then we huddled together under the stairs; back in the farthest reaches, brushing spider webs out of our hair and resisting the urge to run screaming up the stairs as we felt little legs crawling over our arms and faces. Soon, footsteps entered the house above us. “I can’t believe we couldn’t find her,” Gregg’s voice came clearly through the floor above us. “How did you let her get away?” “Me,” a man’s voice answered. “You’re the one she kicked.” Grumbling, and then, “Well, at least we still have the tasty little morsels in the closet.” We could hear the chair pulled away and dropped to the floor. “What

TOUGH LIT. II

AFTAW SPECIAL

the…” sounded a voice. “They’re gone. Search the house.” I couldn’t believe the words. No! They can’t find us. Not now. The police are on the way. I held Callie and Tina’s hands tightly. “Shhhh,” I reminded them as we all pushed back against the wall, trying to burrow into it. Footsteps pounded through the house and then the sound we didn’t want to hear; the basement door opened. A foot came down on the top step at the same time a pounding came on the front door. “Police!” boomed a voice. The foot disappeared back into the kitchen. We huddled, clinging to each other. We heard exclamations and denials issued from the lips of the men and women above. Finally, we heard one voice of authority say, “Hold on! I can settle this right now.” Footsteps once again moved across the floor and the basement door opened. A flashlight beam preceded the man as he came down the stairs. Who is it? Is it help? We stayed still, unsure who carried the light. The light moved around the room and finally sought out our hiding place; revealing three tear-streaked, scared faces. “Girls,” the man said. “It’s okay now. I’m Officer McDaniel. You’re safe.” * * * I put the last box in the car as Callie stood by watching. “I don’t want you to go,” she said, softly. “I know,” I told her. “But, college beckons.” We hugged fiercely, close since our close encounter with danger. Oh, we still have our tiffs, but what sisters don’t? I watched in the rearview mirror as I drove away. Callie moved to hold hands with Clark, her new boyfriend. A nice guy; not pushy like Bane. I smiled as I thought about Jeff. He and I would be in many of the same classes this semester. PJ Hawkinson grew up in the Midwest. She is a Hutchinson Community College graduate. An avid reader since childhood, PJ decided to attempt writing a novel of her own and published Half Bitten. She has just completed a science fiction book with co-author, Karen Wodke, and has hopes of publishing it soon. They are currently working on a suspense novel set in Colorado with many ideas for future books. PJ's other interests include sightseeing off the beaten path, fishing, and paint-by-numbers. She admits to no favorite writer but enjoys the works of Stephen King, JRR Tolkien, Kent Conwell, and Douglas Adams. PJ envisions a life of writing alone and with her longtime friend and co-author. Death by Foreplay (cont’d from p 22 ) they know. But you just said you don’t know any of the kids. Yet I believe you. If you have a gut feeling you know the killer, you probably do.” “I made a list of everyone I've ever met. It is not anyone on my list.” “Even if you think so, you could be wrong. But, let’s assume that you’re right. Great. It’s someone you ‘know’ but haven’t met. Lovely. Why am I here?" "You will catch the killer and bring him or her to justice." "Hah! Me? Me? Ooo-ho-hoo, no. You have me confused with Superwoman. I'm an average ordinary nobody. I teach kindergarten for Christ's sake. There are things I don’t do-quantum physics, my own taxes, and catch murderers. See ya’.” I stood up to go, almost knocking over the rest of the soup. “Sit!” “Hell no!” I said planting my hands on the edge of the table. He stared me down. It was a cross between fierce command and gentle begging. I don’t know how he did it. I sat down and speared a big piece of steamed broccoli. I waved it around as I talked. "I won't do it. I’m not equipped." "I will offer you all the help you need." Yeah, right. I bit down into the broccoli and tried to ignore him. It was impossible. He radiated power. “This is very good,” I said. Riling a rhino is the height of stupidity. “Steamed just the way I like it, still crunchy and crisp with just a hint of butter.” “I will pass your compliments along to the chef.”

VOL 6, ISSUE 2

“You think B.J. would pack a doggie bag?” “Anything you want will be yours.” Why did that sound so good? “You should get your money back from that drama school. You overact.” I looked around. “Nice throne. Too bad you’re insane.” Or I could have had a quick lay to top off my day. “That hunt down a murderer thing? That just pushes the no-way-am-I-gettingto-know-you quotient completely over the top.” I wanted to rip his clothes off. I saw myself sucking him. I shook my head, but the image didn’t clear. The fact that I wasn’t that type of girl did not matter in this case. I could do it. Be smart, Susan, run. Don’t look back. “Susan, it’s not just these deaths. This is a pattern. It shows no sign of stopping. Whoever is doing this is feeding on...something...” "Why me?" "You were a policewoman." "How do you know that? Never mind. I’m not even surprised.” I cut the steak into little pieces. "Yes. I was. For one year. When I was eighteen. I left the force because…well, it doesn’t matter. There are thousands of people who would jump at a chance to look into this. I’m not one of them.” I popped a piece of meat in my mouth. "You left because you never got any credit for your intuition." "You're freaking me out.” "My apologies." “And your being polite is just getting on my nerves.” I saw the corner of his mouth lift a fraction. "A year on the force and thirteen years as a kindergarten teacher is no match for a psycho. Writing traffic tickets and keeping kids from farting on each other doesn’t make me a serial killer hunter." "You have a police background. You teach children, so you are obviously interested in them. You write about vampires, so clearly, so eloquently, so....lovingly." I opened my mouth in shock. No one knew I wrote the Vinny the Vampire Drinks Tomato Juice children’s books. Not a single soul. No. One. "So I figured you must have met some very nice vampires...” “Wrong!” “…and wouldn't be averse to the idea of catching a bad one." "Great.” I pushed away from the table, wiped my hands on the napkin and then again on my skirt. “Honey, you’re sexy as hell. Thanks for dinner. I’m going to forget I ever met you.” Yeah, like that’s possible. I grabbed my purse and slung it over my shoulder. “Now I know why you picked me. You’re a crazy fan. My books are fantasy-for kids who feel like they don’t fit in. I wrote about vampires because I wasn’t creative enough to think of a new species.” He’s a lunatic and I’m provoking him. I was on a roll. I waved my hand in the air. “I’ve never met anyone claiming to be a vampire before today and I’ve gotten along pretty well so far. Just because I wrote those books doesn’t mean I’ll help you with your vigilante crusade.” I stared at the door and willed it to open. Nope, still no super powers. "You've got the wrong girl. I'm an ordinary teacher, with a boring life. I like it that way." I walked towards the door. "You can take your vampire delusion and shove it." (To be continued… we hope!) Dawn Cord Ray has written 3 other contemporary romance novels, two of which fall into the urban paranormal romance category (The Dumb About Men Club and The Even Dumber About Men Club two thirds of the trilogy about three witchy girlfriends). For the last twenty years she has alternated between working in part-time in advertising firms, teaching creative writing groups in my home, and being a health and fitness teacher and expert. She is currently perusing a Masters degree in literacy for adult education.

We’re gearing up for TOUGH LIT III, so send us your crime, mystery, suspense, and dark fantasy stories today! ideagems@aol.com

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Painting the Parlor (cont’d from p 13) “The cops brought you home. The only reason you’re not in jail is you got so many relatives working for the sheriff, and both your brother and sister were on duty when the call came. Ellen dispatched Simon to the nine-one-one, and he convinced his partner to bring you here instead of charging you with drunk driving, breaking and entering, and worse! You deserve to be in jail for my money!” “I know! I know! I should be in jail. You’re right! I was driving? Oh, God! I don’t remember driving! The truck looks all right. I didn’t have a wreck, did I? Breaking and entering? Jesus, how could I have done that?” “Don’t take the Lord’s name in vain, Edgar! You’re in enough trouble already! You weren’t behind the wheel when they picked you up, so there was no proof you’d actually been driving, which is why Simon and David were able to bring you home instead of taking you to jail.” “I wasn’t driving?” “You must have driven from Charlie’s to the Jones’ house. Alison and I went and got the truck from there this morning. It was parked on Debra’s front lawn, under the pecan tree.” “Was I under the tree, in the truck, what? Where was I when Simon got me?” “You were in Debra Jones’ bed, that’s where you were, Edgar Potts! Buck naked, too! That’s what she told the cops, and I believe her. She could have charged you with breaking and entering and with attempted rape! You were barely dressed when they brought you here, shoes and socks in your hands instead of on your feet, and your shirt on backward. And where’s your underwear, anyway? It’s not in the hamper with your shirt and pants!” “Sharon, are you just trying to scare me? Is that the truth that I was picked up at the Jones’ house? Oh my god! Naked?” “Stop swearing! It’s the gospel truth that you were naked and in her bedroom, Edgar. I’m so humiliated I could die. Everyone knows about it. What’s more, Dan Folston is going to sue you, not just to fix the place up, but for loss of business. He says you and your crew must have had some drunken paint-throwing party last night. The funeral parlor is a mess, and he’s having to send customers over to Olsen’s. We’ll never be able to hold up our heads in this town again. We’ll have to move.” Sharon and Edgar didn’t move. Once she got over being furious with Edgar, Sharon laughed with everyone else when people told the story. She even added her own details. Edgar didn’t laugh. He hung his head and turned bright red whenever anyone talked about his adventure, or when he was in the presence of the Jones women, whom he did his best to avoid, but he swore off liquor completely, so good came of the humiliation after all. He even gave up his daily beer and forever after dutifully went to AA meetings twice a week, even becoming a sponsor for others. Folston’s insurance covered the carpet replacement, and Walter’s and Annie’s crews were able to clean up the mess and repaint in four days with overtime. Annie negotiated the agreement, getting Folston to admit that he was partly responsible for leaving the body in the room without letting Edgar know it would be there. She hinted that the family of the deceased might sue Folston if they heard the story. The deceased man who caused all the trouble, fortunately, did not have loved ones in Smithville who would know he’d been painted green and white before his burial. He’d been an eighty-six-year-old inmate at the prison-farm, too old to do much work on the farm, but too gentlenatured to be incarcerated in a more brutal place. He was an old hippie who couldn’t give up drugs, maybe not even while locked up. When the dozen or so friends and relatives came in from Atlanta for the service at Olsen’s two days later, they heard not a breath of scandal. Folston steadfastly denied rigging the body to sit up, so that mystery was never solved. Edgar didn’t make any money on the funeral parlor job, of course. It was a bad loss, but not as bad as he’d expected. He didn’t go bankrupt. He retired twelve months later and turned the business over to Annie— which pleased both her and her siblings. The company prospered, and Edgar never painted anything again except boiled eggs at Easter.

Barbara Pelt McLay retired in 2008 from teaching at the University of South Florida in Tampa, Florida and now spends her time traveling, writing, and editing. While employed, she wrote a humor column for an on-line academic publication. Her current writing projects include a self-help book co-authored with her adult daughter, several short stories, a mystery novel co-authored with a friend and one solo novel. Editing projects include novels, academic papers and dissertations, and academic books.

THE UNDERGROUND CONNECTION

TOUGH LIT. II

A Poem by Linda Boltman Late summer of 1969 There was no place to turn Few people to help. A nurse friend Knew a friend Who’d heard of a doctor Who knew of an organization… Contacting friends and strangers I searched the underground connection. Calling numbers to talk to people Who were only voices Waiting for a phone call Jumping when the phone rang Waiting for secret code names Giving the coded reply Listening to nameless people Give short, precise instructions Putting my life Into the hands of strangers. The first call Came early Saturday morning Telling me the time and place. Two-thirty Stand on the corner of 34th and Elm Wait for a black sedan To give you the secret word. I wait for twenty minutes In the rough part of town Feeling a kinship With my fallen sisters Who also loiter there. The driver pulls up And tells me to get in. I swallow my fear and open the door. We take the elevator to the second floor And walk the long hall To an apartment on the left. A secret knock on the door by the driver Receives a second knock in response. He seems awfully young, But clean cut and nice. Perhaps an intern Putting himself through medical school. The apartment is empty Except for a small Formica table And two chairs Sitting in the middle of the living room.

AFTAW SPECIAL

I approach the car And give the secret word To the old woman Sitting behind the wheel. She responds with the correct response To my coded message And I get in.

In a small bedroom to the right I see a medical table with stirrups. I wonder how it got there With no questions asked. I am surprised at the cleanliness And unexpected wealth. I supposed I expected a slum house With paint peeling from the walls. But I wonder at the neighbors Who adjoin him on either side Who watch the endless stream of women Give the secret knock.

We drive a short ways Before she stops. I am blindfolded And told I cannot see the place. I concentrate on the sounds around me. I memorize the turns

But I am over ten weeks. Afraid to take the chance He instructs me to go home And wait for the code word. There’s a man who specializes In cases such as mine. But of course it will cost me Considerably more. The black sedan takes me back. Where will I get the money? What can be sold When I’ve already sold my soul?

And count off the seconds for blocks Hoping I will be able To lead my father back to the house Should something go awry. I have the feeling We are going in circles. I later find out That I am right. We pull in to a garage And she helps me out. The blindfold slips And I am able to see Without her knowing.

For six days I wait for the phone call Waiting for my “contact” to connect For the sound of whispered voices. Tension and suspense run high Frayed nerves take their toll I am breaking with the strain.

I am led down a sidewalk And into a house Up the narrow stairs To the upstairs bedroom. There are two twin beds Covered with old bedspreads Like my grandmother used to have.

On Sunday night the call comes. I am given instructions And the designated time The donut shop At the corner of Roosevelt and Vine Nine o’clock, three days’ time Wait for an old green Chevy The driver will not get out.

She lays me on the bed And a man’s voice says “Do you have the money?” They open the travel case I can hear the click. I don’t know if they count it But it’s all there. They don’t know what it cost me.

Go to the driver And give the password Remember that you must come alone. The price is now eight-hundred-dollars. Bring the money In one-hundred dollar bills.

A sheet is tied around both knees And back around my neck To simulate stirrups. I choke back my embarrassment And swallow what pride I have left. She must have understood For she gently lays a Kleenex To cover my embarrassment And I am thankful for the blindfold.

We are there early Waiting for the green Chevrolet Watching the continuous string of people Choose chocolate covered donuts. I wonder at the people in the donut shop Who see the endless stream of girls Climb into the green sedan.

I listen for every noise. I hear water running in a sink Footsteps approach And a man’s voice is at my feet. I am given a shot Of sodium penathol And told to count backwards from 100 But I can’t make it to ninety-eight.

A green Chevrolet Old and rusted Turns in to the parking lot And helps a young woman to a van Unsteady on her feet. The green car leaves But returns again Ten minutes past the designated time. The driver does not get out But quickly scans the lot.

VOL 6, ISSUE 2

I awaken to the woman slapping me gently And saying over and over “Wake up now. Wake up!”

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I am crying and drugged Sobbing for myself

If the name Claudia Aragon rings a bell, it should. She wrote the heart-warming stories, “Shantytown, USA.” and “My Best Christmas Ever.” Claudia is one of our an exciting new writers and an outstanding storyteller, capturing the nuances of family life and the difficulties of a hard-scrabble existence she and her family experienced for a number of years. She’s seen some tough times and writes about it crisply, clearly, and with passion. She’s rapidly becoming an AFTAW favorite!

And for the life that is lost. I am told that it’s alright now And given instructions for my care That I have been given Four more shots of antibiotics To counteract the unsterile conditions. “Get her up and walk her!” The doctor sternly instructs. The old woman hesitates Hushing my sobs Stroking my hair. “We’ve got to get her out of here!” The impatient voice repeats. Arms grab at mine and struggle To get me to my feet. I wonder if I’m dying. Linda Boltman is one of our favorite contributors. We look forward to her new book Man in the Moon to be published soon by Jigsaw Press.

Farewell by Claudia Aragon

The lone board Silhouetted against the orange glow Of sunset Stands proudly In the sand To say farewell The final salute As ashes are carried Away from shore To catch one last wave Captured in the frothy waters Swirling merrily within the current Whisked out to sea To surf for all eternity

The Light of Your Love by Claudia Aragon The door is closed The lock latched Curtains drawn An eternity of darkness Shrouding Enveloping the heart The visitor comes Unexpected Rapping at the door Alas there is no answer Persistence abounds The knocking grows louder Urgency behind the fist Insistence…the door must be opened The hand opening Beckoning The click of the latch The visitation of light The drapes no longer drawn Carried out of the darkness By the light of your love

Little Boxes (cont’d from p 11 ) vitality to share with our beleaguered band. He settled comfortably in his chair, surrounded by my family, and spoke directly to Lily as though the rest of us weren’t there. Verbally pulling her into his lap, he managed to bridge the space between her child-self, and the premature adult, uncovering a place to balance her burden between the two. That awareness freed her to remain the child she was, and not feel forced into adulthood before she was ready. It would be waiting for her when she was, and he’d restored her chance to look forward to it. Jax was next. As Mitch explored the validity of his perspective, my son’s worry waned. His open honesty returned, and the small space filled with his child’s spirit of wonder and curiosity at the prospect of new life. Excitement and anticipation replaced our gray and listless mood. Frank hadn’t wrested the lead from Mitch, and waited for his turn to speak – which seemed to be last, because Mitch spoke to me next. “Zeda spent the rest of the day in my office after you left, Natalie.” I had a vague sensation of what was coming, like the beginning of a migraine. “How would you feel about Zeda adopting the baby?” he asked. Frank tensed, I sighed, Jax looked at his hands, Lily looked at Mitch, and Mitch looked at me. I hadn’t gotten a grip on having the baby, let alone giving it away. And why hadn’t Zeda come to me herself? Okay, Greta, I thought. Big hurdle, difficult jump, and I doubt my long stride can clear it without tumbling. “I’m getting a lot of grief from my senior partners over placing a baby with an employee,” Mitch confided as I walked him to the door. “Virgil would love to have a reason to discredit me.” “Have you thought about starting your own firm?” I asked. We talked about his plans, his future, and his boys. I just kept talking instead of getting his coat. “Why hasn’t Zeda been able to adopt in all these years?” I asked him. “I’ve never looked into it; she’s insisted that business and personal matters shouldn’t mix, until now.” “Does applying as a single parent make it more difficult?” I asked. “A little, but not that much,” he answered. “She did ask me to help her get a quit-claim deed on some property she still shared with her ex husband. His name is Graham, and he seems like a nice guy. I ventured close to the adoption topic when I spoke to him, and he broke the conversation like frozen china.” I pulled his coat from the closet, brushing it across my face, as he turned his back for me to help him find the armholes in the slippery satin lining. I grinned aloud, guiding his hands until the empty arms became thick with his body, filling the leather with his shape as it tucked him inside. “Thank you ma’am,” he drawled, as I signaled that the job was done with a pat on his back. “What else would you be doing on a fresh fall day?” I asked. “Oh,” he said, as if building anticipation for a bedtime story. “Saturdays are pedals, pancakes, and planes days.” I raised my eyebrows and he answered them. “The boys race their bikes ahead of me to Flappy Jack’s Pancake House outside of Wailington Park, with me behind them performing ‘God Bless America,’ at the top of my labored lungs in my beautiful baritone. I laughed as I pictured it. “And the planes?” I asked. “Waverly Airport lying on our backs watching huge floating shapes wander through the sky, and letting the planes fly over us close enough to reach up and touch their wheels. They never get tired of it.”

TOUGH LIT. II

AFTAW SPECIAL

His voice stopped and I didn’t want it to. Listening to him, there was no baby, no adoption, no infertility, and no puzzle picture to hold together. He backed out of the door, and I followed pulling it close behind me. “Thank you,” I said. “I’ll see you soon, Natalie.” “How long have you known him?” Frank asked when I walked back into the kitchen. Since I was old enough to read fairy tales, I wanted to say. I’d never known anyone like him - except in my room alone after my mother left, reading about forgotten princesses and hoping for the happy ending that I knew didn’t go further than the distant castle on the last page. “Just two days ago,” I said, and helped him load the dishwasher. The next few weeks were a flurry of adjusting, and the plans to place the baby with Zeda were moving along. On our way to church one Sunday, I voiced my mental picture of Lily in the youth group in a few months. “This is what Christianity is all about,” Frank said. “Who’s going to throw the first stone?” But it was such a bizarre situation, and I smiled at the thought of pious Mrs. Bulifant trying to ignore Lily’s growing belly. Frank continued his audible Christian ethic reverie, expecting no response to the familiar material. Frank is a good teacher if he isn’t contradicted. Debating Frank is like arm wrestling with Hercules. There is no winning. “It’s Sunday Frank, they’ve done their homework.” “We’ll just do some quick problems,” he responded and called the kids to come inside for his peremptory homework drill. As usual, the tension mounted. Lily just took her father’s impatience in stride and knew he’d get over it quickly, while Jax visibly deflated. Frank’s stringent coaching reminded me of an old German piano teacher I’d had in fifth grade. “Nein, nein, nein,” she’d bark into my ear while rapping her rhythm stick very close to my fingers. I froze. It certainly didn’t bring forth lilting, spontaneous music with nimble, confident fingers. I cringed now. Jax’s head was bowed, and all three had red flushed faces. My interfering just made him angrier, so I left the room. Frank and I talked frequently about his erratic temper, usually after a ragged fight. He’d acknowledge his need to use milder methods, I’d admit my obsession with protecting the kids from skinned knees, and all would be well – until the next time. Zeda and Lily chatted through a thousand baby details while we ate lunch at a downtown cafe. Zeda, as animated as ever, was as much a child as Lily. I watched my little girl, thinking that her perspective of what was happening to her seemed two-dimensional, as if it were going on outside of herself and she was a spectator at a significant performance, only partially grasping her part. I supposed the intensity of the climax and its aftermath would crescendo soon enough. Lily went to the bathroom, and Zeda went over her list of things to finish before Mitch and his boys left to go camping that evening. “They’re going to be out of touch for almost ten days,” she said. An attractive older couple was being seated two tables away from us and Zeda waved her napkin at them. The man waved back smiling and I knew who he was before she said - his whole face twinkled with his eyes. “I don’t know what Mitch would do without them,” she said. “What about his wife?” I asked. “She’s never with them; I don’t know whose choice that is.” I was watching Mitch’s mother pour cream in her coffee. “How does he drink his coffee?” I asked. “Who?” She looked at me distractedly, then stopped. I took my eyes off his mother to meet Zeda’s. She exhaled, took my hand, and asked: “What the hell are you doing, Natalie?” Tears started rolling and they wouldn’t stop. I felt caught in a spinning roulette, discarding the hand I was dealt, choosing instead the danger of gambling my values and my voice away. We dropped Zeda off, and I watched her light steps and yellow skirt close in on the revolving doors, as Virgil McCormick spun out of them. He gave me a politician’s smile before walking by the car window without speaking. I was pulling away from the curb when my cell phone rang. “Natalie,” Mitch said, “Zeda’s adoption has been denied.” I looked back in time to see the swish of her yellow skirt before she was

VOL 6, ISSUE 2

churned into the building. “Judge Ottgold received the review board’s recommendation and called Virgil with it,” he said angrily. “Then, he had the audacity to remind me that the Judge wasn’t obligated to disclose the review board’s reasons for denial.” “How did you end up in that place?” I asked. “He hasn’t always been this way. Our differences used to work in our favor, balancing the firm, and attracting a broad pool of clients. We served together on the board of the Wailington Children’s Home twenty years ago when the town was warring over an incident that happened there.” I interrupted him, “I didn’t know there was a children’s home around here.” “It’s now Wailington Park, the one down State Road 41, about fifteen miles southeast of town. The old building was in the middle of the land requisitioned for the park. The children were causing trouble, an eighteen-year-old girl was caught having sex with a sixteen-year-old boy, and the scandal fueled the tear-it-down argument. The town was divided, with Virgil pushing for its demise.” “I go there a lot, Mitch, those beautiful old gardens look like they’ve been there forever.” “They were designed by Oscar Wailington, a member of Abraham Lincoln’s cabinet,” he said, “and the kids from the Home maintained them.” “What finally happened?” “I was outvoted,” he said. “All that’s left of the Home is that chimney. “What happened to the children?” I asked. “They were sifted through the system and disappeared.” “And you’ve been working for lost children ever since, haven’t you?” I said, not expecting an answer, and there was none. “I’m leaving tonight, Natalie, and I have to check something before I tell her. She’s going to need a friend tomorrow.” Zeda was icy calm. I knelt on the floor of the baby nursery and held her while she rocked back and forth. Lily was still in her first trimester, but every detail of this nursery was full-term finished, as if the baby was in the next room for a diaper change and would be back in Zeda’s arms in a minute. The crib looked like a coffin. “I was arrested on a drug charge when I was eighteen,” she said. “Is that all? Surely, that’s fairly common these days, that doesn’t make sense.” “A lot of things aren’t making sense,” she said. “I found an envelope with $50,000 in cash in Mitch’s front desk drawer today,” she said coolly. “What are you talking about, Zeda?” The haunting press of the nursery was too thick to think. “Let’s go in the other room,” I said, gathering her up and leading her to her sofa. I poured us each a drink before sitting close beside her. “Start at the beginning,” I said, “and go ‘til the end.” “Adoptive parents come by all the time, bringing gifts, thank-you notes, pictures, you know.” “Yes, I said, impatiently. “Two families came by today and left notes – one even left flowers – on my desk while I wasn’t there. One couple came before I got there this morning and the other came at lunchtime.” “What about the money, Zeda?” “When I went into Mitch’s top drawer for his billing book, I saw this fat envelope that looked like it had money in it. If it were, I had to deposit it. It was $50,000 in cash. “Where did it come from?” “I don’t know, and Mitch is camping somewhere with no cell coverage, so I took it to Virgil.” “He’s being investigated,” Zeda said, in an empty voice. The frantic protectiveness I expected was missing. “There has to be a way to reach him, Zeda.” “Well, at least, the Sheriff’s detective working on the case is a good friend of his,” she said. “Mitch placed a baby with Dick Lawrence’s daughter several years ago, and Dick thinks the world of Mitch.”

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The sun went down in dying splendor, and the town in the distance vanished in shadows. The peacefulness of the view passed me as I headed home from a long chilling walk. The scene had no depth, just a painted curtain - a backdrop for the flat symbol of my house with its graying picket fence. Mitch called before I reached our driveway. “I’ve been arrested, Natalie. I don’t know what’s going on.” I wasn’t surprised that he called me instead of all the others he could have talked to. I dropped the carpool off and turned on the radio. Ray Charles was crooning, You Don’t Know Me. I turned it up and sang with him at the top of my lungs. “You’ll never know the one who dreams of you at night…” But I was sure he knew. My revere was interrupted by an assumed tap on my shoulder. “I’m not listening, God!” I yelled over Ray. “I’ve done the right things all my life. Are you having fun watching me fail? I trusted you!” Greta’s voice replaced Ray’s: “The only person you trust is you, Natalie. Let go!” “But I can’t change who I am,” I yelled at the radio. My thoughts were blowing like the scattered leaves on my lawn when I turned in to the driveway. Mitch pulled in behind me, and I turned the radio off. “Come in,” I said, fumbling for my keys. I was shivering as a cold November wind whipped my hair around my eyes. He held my purse open so I could dig through it, but the keys were still in my hand. We laughed, and I felt calmer than I had in a long time. There was nothing to be calm about, but we left the turmoil outside in the wind. Inside, it was warm, with the lingering smell of bacon, a fresh pot of coffee, and Mitchell Shepherd in the room. He sat down heavily while I poured our coffee. He’d been arraigned earlier that morning. “When we got home from camping last night,” he began, “Dick Lawrence came to the door and poured out this whole incredible thing.” “I thought you’d be able to explain it immediately.” I said. “I have no idea where that money came from! They’ve examined the lobby security tapes, which show two of my families getting off the elevator on my floor. It looks like one of them paid me for their baby.” “No cameras in your office?” “Nope.” “And they denied it?” I asked rhetorically. “Of course,” he replied, “they wouldn’t have done it, but they surely wouldn’t say so if they had. When Zeda found the money in my desk, and gave it to Virgil, he called the Bar Association and the prosecutor’s office.” “Why?” “To protect himself,” he continued angrily. “Would he take that kind of risk? Go that far?” “I don’t know,” he answered, “but I need to figure it out before I’m tried for this. And Natalie, someone else is going to have to handle Lily’s adoption.” We spent most of the day talking through every scenario, until it was almost time for the kids to get home. “You aren’t driving carpool today?” He asked as we walked slowly to the door. “Not this week,” I answered turning to get his coat from the closet. I felt his silent hands cover my shoulders, and I knew exactly how the rim of his mouth turned, how the landscape of his jaw grew, like a harvested farmer’s field, covered in stubble, joining a freshly plowed one. I knew his eyes still twinkled in their blue and pensive calm, I knew him, and I wanted him. I turned around with my eyes closed. He hesitated, waiting for me to look at him, but I kept my eyes boarded shut, instead of sharing those few seconds with him before he kissed me. If I’d opened my eyes, if I’d looked at what I was doing, if I’d turned and run, would life be different now? Fickle headlines lynched Mitch in ugly bold letters. Frank stayed on the phone for hours trying to find out what was happening. I looked for my expired Xanax, couldn’t find them, and still spent most of the next week in bed, with my phone turned off. Lily came in chatting about the looks she was getting in gym class and showing me how the snap on the waist of her jeans wouldn’t close. Jax sat on the floor by the bed to do his

homework. I slept. I had drifted into a moral no-man’s-land with no return recourse, and moving deeper into the heart of the war. I was a prisoner of the hollow promise of “happily ever after,” crumbling my values for a fantasy. A week later, I started seeing Mitch as often as possible. We met at Wailington Park, in one of the old politician’s secret gardens. Many times that winter, the soft vapor of fog misted us inside its pale gray walls, so all we could see was the lone chimney of the razed Children’s Home standing black and sharp against the back of our small world. We huddled on a picnic table, walked when we could, or sat in my minivan against the outside cold. His trial was set for May, just before the baby was due, which, although unspoken, was when we’d open our eyes to the consequences of what we were doing. Virgil appeared to be supporting him and supplied an income while Mitch was away from work. Zeda left McCormick, Granier, and Shepherd for a private firm in one of the downtown storefronts (its renovation funded by Mitch’s “Main Street Project”). She had stopped calling, and I missed our friendship, but the comfort of its familiarity was covered in loss and guilt. The investigation and the unknown stretched on and on, intensifying with each dead end. Mitch was sinking in the injustice of the mystery and it became more and more difficult to encourage him to keep fighting. Christmas came and went, winter slugged on. My kids needed me, I wasn’t there. I drove the carpool, I went to church, but I still wasn’t there. Frank knew something was wrong but didn’t say much. “When are you going to let go, Natalie?” Greta said into the phone. “I can stop seeing him, but I’ll never be able to let him go,” I said with a distant flatness. “It’s like an addiction, like a genie granting every wish I’ve ever made.” “I’m not talking about letting him go,” she said. “I know what I have to do, Greta, I just have to gather the strength to go through with it.” “You’re stronger than you think,” she replied. I knew that the life I had chosen was crashing to a halt, that innocent victims would be trapped in the wreckage if I didn’t take a dramatic detour. Spring was laboring to breathe new life into winter’s dead wood as I pulled into the Park to meet Mitch once again. When I looked at him, there was no guilt, no confusion, no hurt, no past, no future, no baby, no Frank - just us. We sat in his front seat holding each other like teenagers. He drew a long, weary breath and it stuck in his throat on its way out, dampening my hair. “Don’t do this,” he whispered. “This is we, not me, Mitch.” I kept going without looking at him. “You need the values you’ve walked away from to get through this. All you have to lean on now is self-condemning guilt, and you’d be completely ruined if we were caught.” “Ha,” he scoffed, “What about alone?” “We’ve been alone before, Mitch.” “Yes, but we didn’t know it,” he said to the steering wheel. As I stepped out of his car to leave, a blast of frigid leftover winter air stunned me, and the haunting chimney of the ruined children’s home followed me as I left him. Frank came home in the middle of that afternoon. I was in the laundry room, staring at dirty clothes, and turned to see him standing quietly in the doorway. He wasn’t crying but he had been. The air in the small space felt wet like it was about to rain and it pressed me to the wall, as I waited for what I knew was coming. “What’s wrong?” I asked. “Why, Natalie?” he asked simply. “Why?” He wouldn’t stop, and each time sliced deeper into my spreading wound, a hurt that I knew was not as deep as his was. “Mitch’s wife called me, hysterical,” he said. Bearing the weight of what I was doing was nothing like the compression of exposure, guilt, fear, and regret that was crushing me now. “Tell me what’s happening?” he begged. “Say something logical!” I backed out of the laundry room. “I DON’T KNOW!” I screamed.

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Without regard for his confusion, I grabbed my keys and left the door gaping as I ran. I drove blindly for hours, wavering between staying and trying to heal the marriage, or bolting on colt legs, hoping to train a steady stride without running wild. Guileless eyes stared at me as I drove. They didn’t deserve this; the swamp I’d been swimming in for months was a tidal wave to Frank and it would drown my children. I hoped the God I was losing faith in would help me stand on my choice. Frank was ominously calm when I walked in. “I’d like to work through this, if you think there’s any way you can eventually forgive me, Frank.” “I’ve scheduled a meeting with Pastor Byron and the Board of Deacons, so we can decide how to handle it,” he said. “Why,” I stammered, “this isn’t an inquisition! It’s adultery, marriages, private lives!” My voice had risen to a throat knotted screech. “They are our church family, we go through the tough stuff together,” he said. “And Mitchell Shepherd needs to be exposed for the fraud that he is,” he said bitterly. “And by the way, while you were out with your precious pastime this morning, I got a call from the school principal, Jax was found in the gym equipment storage room with your Xanax. Lily’s daughter was born two months later, temporarily replacing the dull shadows in our home with the sharp climax of having and losing a child. We didn’t hear from Zeda for the rest of the pregnancy, and the baby went to a middle-aged couple whom Mitch had been working with. They weren’t at the hospital, but our new attorney delivered the tiny girl to them, in Indianapolis, an hour after she was born. My heart both sang and bled for Lily through childbirth, fixing on my granddaughter’s beautiful small face when she slipped from her temporary home. Lily chose not to meet her, and I’m glad. I’ll remember enough for both of us. And so, after the lifetime of only months, Lily’s baby disappeared from our lives in an instant. (To be continued in our next TOUGH LIT. issue!) Amanda Garretson loves words, words, words – writing them, reading them, and learning how to creatively combine their endless assortment into ever new and interesting packages. The word play, logic, and fantasy, of Lewis Carroll are a wonder and an inspiration to her. Amanda’s heart’s desire is to be “no fool.” (“He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.”— Jim Elliot) A “Writing” merit award was given for Little Boxes by the short story moderator on the writing.com community. Awards in the community are purchased by the presenter, as an award to the author themselves as opposed to an award for a particular piece of work. Here’s what the moderator said: "RARELY do I hand out this merit badge, but your story clearly puts you in this league. You ARE a writer and your story does, indeed, draw the reader in until the end! Well done! Looking forward to reading more of your material!" Heirs of Justice (cont’d from p 15) Jeffreys and Megan nodded “no.” The camera focused on Claudine and Mark’s faces as the judge spoke and announced the new witnesses. Claudine sat there stunned. Who were these witnesses? Why didn’t Jeffreys tell her? She gave him a look. His look reassured her that it was a good sign. Maybe for his side, but what about her? She shot a glance at Mark. He pretended he didn’t notice her and stared straight at the judge. Sure, wouldn’t he? The camera was doing its best to keep up with the expressions of Claudine, Mark and the jury. They noticed her anguished look when the judge announced new witnesses and Mark’s calm demeanor. What was going on? Mark was driving and her son wasn’t. He was alive and her son wasn’t. Claudine thought of those wonderful lines in Macbeth, “And tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow.” So be it. She had a desire to wave to the

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camera and tell them the truth will told and finished. She hoped but knew if she did, she would be put in an institution for observation. She stood up, after most of the people had left. She gave Jeffreys a nod walked out quickly through a side door, fled to her car and drove home. She knew Jeffreys would call her once she was home. She turned her phone down not to hear any stupid dialogue from him or well-meaning friends. She could wait to the next day. That night was the longest day of her life. It was even longer than the night before she married, when she pondered whether or not she was making the right decision of giving up her freedom. When she did, she fell right out and made a cool, sophisticated, happy bride the next day. Here, it wasn’t so easy because she couldn’t fathom who the witnesses were. She got up to have a glass of wine to chill out. When that didn’t work, she marked English book reports on travels. She realized that she forgot to correct them before she left. One of her students e-mailed if they were going to get them back. She e-mailed that she would bring them to school after she marked them. Surprisingly enough, they were fun to read. However, that didn’t work. She took out some of the drama lessons she prepared and added some comments she noticed during the trial. What a way to try to fall asleep. She was still awake. Claudine finally closed the light and hoped that sleep would come. The harsh sound of the alarm woke Claudine immediately. She jumped out of bed, took a fast, cool shower and splashed her face with cold water several times, and dressed quickly. She looked in the mirror and added more makeup than usual to cover the tired signs she saw from the restless night. Her roots were beginning to show. Hopefully her hair wouldn’t grow too fast and she could hold out for another week or two. She didn’t want to look like Hamlet’s Ophelia on the way to her suicide. Satisfied, she popped a cookie in her mouth and drove to the courthouse. Who were these witnesses? Were they new friends of the boys, teachers, who? What evidence could or would prove that Mark’s guilt? Claudine parked the car and walked quicky and straight ahead to the courtroom, nodded to Jeffreys, and sat down. “I see some of us didn’t fare too well last night. It’s going to be okay.” he assured her. “Time will tell,” she answered curtly. “Please state your name.” “Joel Hefton.” “And you are...?” stated Jeffreys. “I’m the county coroner. Been in that business for the past fifteen years.” “What can you tell us about the deceased and the survivor?” The camera caught Claudine’s expression and gasp when Hefton mentioned the deceased, and switched to Mark’s bowed head and tears when he mentioned, the survivor. “Was there any alcohol in Mark’s body?” “Oh, yes. There was alcohol in both men and both were way over the state limit.” “So, both were responsible for the crash.” “Not really. The decease wasn’t driving.” “Are you telling me,” Megan insisted in her harsh tone, “that both had a lot of alcohol in their system.” “Yes, I am,” Hefton, reiterated, calmly, “according to the tests that were conducted at the lab, both were legally drunk according to the New York State Laws on DUI.” Megan stood her ground. “Are you sure?” “I can give these reports and you will see for yourself.” “Fine, I will. Thank you.” “What about fingerprints on the steering wheel that belonged to the deceased?” she demanded. “There were no fingerprints of the decease on the steering wheel on Mark’s clothing or on Mark’s hands. Nothing. Nothing at all. Okay?” “Thank you.” “Mr. Jeffreys?” “No, nothing at the moment.”

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Claudine sat there stunned. Why was this woman so insisted that Kevin was to blame. Why? I must ask Jeffreys about her. What was her background? Was she connected to a hospital? Did Kevin beat out a relative of hers in the scholarship? Judge Manero stated, “You may step down. Let’s call the next witness.” “State your name, please?” “Amy Valone. Do you promise to tell the truth and nothing but the truth, so help you God?” “Yes, I do,” the petite blonde replied sadly. “How do you know the young men?” asked Ms Megan. “I dated Mark for awhile until we graduated.” “And not now?” “No,” Amy answered in a low voice. “Sometimes he clowned around too much behind the wheel like pretending to skid off the road where the road wasn’t slick. I got nervous.” “Are you an expert on the highways where you drive?” “I don’t understand what you mean?” “What did you know about the road he was driving on?” “I drive to work on it everyday. If it was slick I would have switched to another road or slowed down. That’s logical, don’t you think? I didn’t have the need to be so stupid and try road tricks when someone was in the car with me!” She snapped, then changed the tone of her voice. She and said sadly, “Mark said he wanted to do more with his life but he felt Kevin always seemed to be a stiff competition - Kevin always did the right thing, and knew what he wanted and Mark didn’t. I mean, they weren’t twins or related to each other. He was such a baby at times. Mark wanted to work in computers. He was so helpful to all of us in the computer programs. Kevin didn’t attend the same college. I don’t know what the hangup was. All I know is that I’m off to getting a Masters in education. I told him maybe he should have considered doing the same thing and teach computers. Mark is a computer genius. Whenever we were altogether, we all got along. After all, we all grew up together. There were no fights or animosity, but I was afraid when he got behind the wheel. He wasn’t a big drinker, or he wasn’t when he was with me. I would have driven or left to go with someone else especially when he was in this Macho Mark moods. I feel so badly,” Amy sobbed. “I don’t know why this could happen. I don’t know.” “Do you have any questions, Mr Jeffereys?” “What was Mark’s behavior when you were all together? Did he ever mention that he resented Kevin’s decision to be a doctor or to win a fabulous scholarship to medical school?” “No, I think he was disappointed in himself that he wasn’t sure of himself as Kevin. It was such a stupid thing. He kept saying, “Who will be more successful? And why? I mean, we are only 21/22 years old. We’re not old people.” Amy stopped herself, embarrassed. Those in courtroom laughed or smiled. The camera caught those smiles and grins immediately. “Do you think Mark was jealous of Kevin and wanted to see him dead on arrival at the hospital and not arriving as a volunteer or newly focused MD to be?” “No, never! He tried to be a doctor. He wasn’t the type. He felt Kevin was more suited. Mark thought he would probably faint when serious accidents arrived at the hospital. Never! What a cruel thing to say! It seemed as though Kevin survived when his dad died and did well, whereas Mark had two parents and no excuses for clowning around. I don’t know,” Amy looked at Mark with a pathetic look, “I don’t know what he was thinking.” “Maybe,” Jeffreys answered, “if he got his so called ‘best friend, his buddy’ out of the way, he could live a better life with no more competition.” “That is outrageous!” said Ms. Megan, “How dare you accuse my client of murder? Don’t you think he would have surmised that he would wind up in jail for this crime? This is outrageous!” “Okay folks, simmer down.” said the judge. “Mr. Jeffreys do you have anything else to add to this?”

“Well, what do you think Amy? Do you think Mark would have been happier if Kevin was out of the way?” “I told him that maybe he should move to another state or town and start a new career there, because no one would judge him. I don’t know.” “What did he say?” “Nothing. He just shrugged his shoulders like he always did when he couldn’t think of a fast answer.” “Thank you.” “I’m sorry Mark, I thought I was helping you.” Mark just nodded and kept his head down. Claudine’s head was spinning as she listened to Amy. Her description of Mark’s behavior brought back a lot of memories when Kevin and Mark went on day trip to the mountains when they were 18 or 19 years old. Kevin looked upset and angry. “What’s the matter, Kevin? Did you get into a fight or an accident with Mark?” “Oh, please, Mom, don’t ask. Mark sometimes is nuts!” Hours later, she saw that Kevin was still aggravated. “Okay, young man, spill the beans. What’s the problem? For heaven's sake, what could he have done? Get a parking ticket?” Kevin was upset because Mark insisted on driving the edge of the mountain road and then pulled back. “What was wrong with him? He could have gotten you killed!” “And the people near us. They reported him to the police. He, of course, talked his way out of it. You know Mark.” “Was he drinking?” “No, thank God, or the two or us would have been taken to jail.” “Does this happen all the time?” “No, only when his stupid brain ceases to function as normal. I never know when this ‘thing’ is going to hit. And how many fender benders he’s gone through because if his parents knew they would take the car away from him. I only know when I’m with him. I don’t know what happens when he is by himself if any have the same experiences. He may be a nice, clean cut kid, Mom, but Mark is one of those people who is a macho maniac.” Claudine sat there stunned, “Oh, my God.” Did Jeffreys know about this? Did his parents know about this? Her mind was reeling. She heard the request for the next witness. “Mr. Jeffreys, please call the next witness.” “The next witness is Todd Jamison.” The tall, lanky, Jamison walked to the witness stand and took the oath. “Tell the jury and the court, how do, er, how did you know Kevin, the deceased, and Mark?” The camera surveyed this court, especially Claudine and Mark as Jeffreys made that slip. Both bolted, and faced each other. Mark knew Claudine’s look registered, “Lucky, you.” Mark grimaced and kept his head down. (What will the verdict be? Read the climactic conclusion in out next TOUGH LIT issue! To be continued…) Dr. Rosalie H. Contino is our most prolific contributor! A second generation Italian-America, Rosalie resides in Brooklyn where she is a costume designer, consultant, and lecturer for multiple productions and events. Her book, Born to Create, is available on Amazon.com.

Eternal Nocturne (cont’d from p 24 ) The beast hesitated for a brief moment before taking the command to flee. Desrik watched it leave. Where he was going, he would need no mount to carry him back. There is no coming back for me. He sucked in a deep breath and ran towards a place along the wall far from the doorway. Up he leapt, his booted feet scraping along jagged stones, his hands grabbing onto a horizontal pole that had perhaps once been used to bear a flag or banner. With consummate skill, he swung his body from the pole and onto another section of uneven stones. His feet ran along the slanted surface until his hands secured a hold on an

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outcropping of stone. Without pause, he continued to scale the wall, climbing and leaping in defiance of the storm’s savage downpour. In a short time, he reached an arched windows, one of the few where glass remained in the stead of wooden boards. It was then that he hesitated. Staring back at him from within the glass was a face he almost didn’t recognize. The once-smooth features had become haggard, worn by trials too terrible to reflect on. Beard growth peppered his cheeks and chin, and the eyes were hard and cold. Gone was the man who had been known for his warmth and kindness, replaced by this shadow born of ice and suffering. My former self will not go unavenged, he silently promised the reflection. We will all be avenged, all of us who have suffered from this treachery and betrayal. Without further hesitation, he unsheathed the straight sword worn at his hip, the traditional weapon of a Drudwyn Knight. Patience giving way to passion, he brought the exotic weapon around and into the window. Shards of glass shattered inward in a ferocious cascade, heralding his arrival as he rolled through the cleared archway. The foyer’s floor was a long drop down, but an old, faded tapestry clung to the wall by the window’s side. Without a moment’s pause, he plunged his sword into the fabric and leapt. Fighting gravity’s fatal grasp, he slid down the wall, his sword tearing through the tapestry as he went, minimally slowing his rapid descent. The cloth, however, did not span the wall’s entire height, and so Desrik was forced to leap again, springing from the tapestry to grab onto a partially collapsed pillar standing in the foyer’s center. Perhaps once used for some decorative purpose, the pillar and those clustered around it had long ago lost all artistic appeal, though now they sufficiently served Desrik’s more practical needs. He flung himself from one pillar to another, sliding down its smooth length until he reached the ground. On his feet again, he stripped the cloak from his shoulders, removing the burden of its wet weight. Knowing that this desperate quest would require the use of all his potential, all his training and skill as a knight of the revered order, he had opted against cumbersome armor and had settled on an outfit of dark fabrics to allow for greater maneuverability. The only noticeable weight spawned from the padded leather he wore over his chest and along his arms and lower legs. He took in another breath and tossed his head back, flinging long wisps of bushy black hair from over his eyes. And then he started across the foyer, towards one of the two stairways that spiraled upwards. Two figures emerged from the stairway directly ahead of him. They were dressed identically in form-fitting outfits of black, their faces shrouded within hoods that concealed all but their eyes. He had learned from previous, violent experience that they were trained in exotic arts similar to the Drudwyn. Yet he did not hesitate; he was the very best of the Drudwyn, their captain and champion. Thus it was with a near eager sense of rage that he ran to greet them with the tip of his sword. He didn’t reach them before they could draw their own swords, but such was his fury that he did not slow or pause. He ducked under the first man’s swipe from his right, whirling on the balls of his feet and bringing his blade around in a cut for the second man’s hip. Cloth and blood splashed onto the floor, and Desrik quickly reversed the grip on his sword, catching the first man’s next slash in a brisk parry. Not losing momentum, he snapped one leg into the air, slamming his heel into the man’s neck. As his enemy went down, he followed him to the ground, sinking to one knee and driving his blade deep into the man’s throat. Not bothering to finish the remaining man, he took to the stairs, feet pumping, eyes narrowed, sword thirsty. Two more figures converged on him, the first coming in with a wicked thrust. Desrik parried and twisted himself around in a complete circle to the right. He darted his sword up for the attacker’s head, but the other man managed to raise his own sword in time, and the blades screeched together in a terrible symphony. Noticing that the second figure was almost upon him, Desrik swiftly hammered his foot into his current opponent’s ankle. The man stumbled,

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and Desrik grabbed onto the back of his head in his free hand, ramming his face into the stone of the wall beside them. Turning around, letting the body crumple to the steps, he plunged his sword straight down, deflecting the newcomer’s incoming slash. Rolling the locked blades up and around, he used his free hand to grasp onto this foe’s wrist, trying to wrestle the other’s weapon away. To facilitate the confiscation, he wheeled himself around on his heels and smashed his elbow into the side of the man’s hooded head. His adversary’s sword fell into his waiting clutches and, after slicing through his throat, Desrik continued his bloody ascent. Three more of the black-garbed figures advanced on him at the next landing, swords held at the ready. It was almost as though they had expected this daring intrusion. It matters little, he bitterly mused. Death is what I came to find, and Death will not hide from me. He ran towards them and dived into a roll, evading one man’s chop and coming up from behind. Slicing into the back of that man’s knees, Desrik twirled, catching another foe’s blade in the triangular, pointed crosspiece of his knight’s sword. Twisting the grip, he forced the other’s blade down, leaving him open for a pommel-strike to the face from his second sword. As this man started to reel back from the blow, Desrik spun and brought both his swords up over his face, crossing the blades to deflect the third man’s anticipated strike. Knees bent, he pushed forward, launching the man back and into the wooden rail. Without relenting, he followed through, bringing the straight sword in his right hand down into his opponent’s blade, pinning it against the railing. With the sword in his left, he gave a sudden thrust into the man’s neck. Blood splashing onto him, he left the sword within the other’s flesh, scooped another sword up from the ground, and carried on. From the top of the spiraling stairway, another figure started towards him, his arm snapping back to hurl a knife. Surrendering to battle-honed instinct, Desrik dropped onto his stomach, clearing the way for the dagger to slam into the stone behind him. Coming back up to his feet, he flung the sword in his left hand, watching in satisfaction as the blade smashed into the other’s face. Soon he was at the top, where the two stairways joined in a single landing that extended into a long, dark corridor. His knight’s sword still held in the grip of his right hand, he continued onwards. As he walked down the hall, he didn’t so much hear as feel movement from behind. He brought his sword down from over his shoulder, catching his attacker’s blade before it could bite into his neck. He pushed his sword up against the other’s, pivoting on the balls of his feet as he did so, coming around to face this next assailant. The hooded man came in with a lunge, but Desrik neatly stepped to the right and snapped his foot out for the other’s ankle. Balance lost, his attacker was now easy prey. Yet, just as he was about to drive his sword into the man’s head, he caught a reflection flashing from his blade. He threw himself to the side, barely evading the dagger that had been thrown from across the corridor. The slender blade sank deeply into the padding over his left bicep, earning a brief grunt of pain. I won’t be stopped! Not now! Not yet! The thought was a scream inside his mind as he sprang back to his feet, grabbing his first assailant by the throat and pushing him in front of him to use as a shield of flesh. Another knife tore through the air, slicing into his captive’s chest, and another slammed into the man’s shoulder. Each drew a muffled cry of agony. Carrying the man’s dead weight, Desrik pushed on, determined to reach the knife-thrower. Another knife cut through his captive’s shoulder, coming dangerously close to bouncing into his eye. Cursing, he plucked the dagger out from his own bicep and twirled himself around the dying body. He hurled the dagger across the distance. The missile shot wide of its target, clattering against the wall, but while the knife-thrower was momentarily distracted, Desrik abandoned his captive and ran forward. Before his enemy could reorient himself, he was in the air, both feet colliding with the man’s breast. He met the ground on his shoulders and instantly sprang up, slamming one foot out in a hard kick to other’s face. Hearing the sickening crunch of breaking bone, Desrik discarded his

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adversary and rushed on. Another figure leapt at him from the shadows, shoving him hard against the wall to his left. He grunted, his hand losing its hold on his sword. The other man brought a knee up into his gut, and then an elbow down into his head. Desrik met the floor in a vicious thud, but he maintained enough sense to roll, escaping what could have been a paralyzing kick. On his back, he snapped both feet into his attacker’s legs, applying pressure from different angles and tripping the other man. Soon they were both rolling on the stone floor, fists pounding furiously into one another. One particularly fierce punch launched Desrik back, and he stumbled onto his feet, shaking his head while vision blurred behind a nimbus of stars. His senses returned in time to warn him of the other man charging towards him. He leapt to the side, fluidly grabbing onto the man’s head and shoving his face into a nearby window. The glass splintered and cracked before finally shattering, and still Desrik continued the brutal motions until the ensuing screams had bled away into nothingness and his fingers had become drenched in the sticky warmth of blood. Desrik stumbled back, staring at the twitching, dying body and the blood coating his hand. How did it come to this? How far have I fallen? The thoughts came unbidden, came unwanted and without warning. They threatened to restore a clarity that he did not need right now, that he could not bear to feel. Soon it will end, soon it will be over, he told himself, fighting against an inner wave of despair. He knew that this was the only way. He had no other option available to him. The knighthood had been played as a pawn in an elaborate scheme, and all that remained to him now was the course of the drastic, of the desperate. I’m the only one left. Fresh pain blossomed in his heart, and he limped towards his fallen sword, scooping it up and moving on. They came at him again and again, until the violence was absolute, until it had become a world of its own. Desrik’s reality had transformed itself into the cruel harmony of parry, slash, and thrust. Feeling was lost beneath desire, and anger was a thing more radiant than the daytime sun. The persistent screech of clashing steel was now his anthem, the requiem he composed for all those he met within this damned place. At the end of the corridor, he kicked the two arched doors inward, and he stalked forward with all the menace of a predator ready to pounce, eager to bring death to all in his way. The chamber awaiting him was long and wide, its furnishings sparse. Old paintings hung from the walls, and decorative statues and vases littered the dusty floor. Windows spanned the length of both walls, flooding the interior with the pale, intermittent glow of flashing lightning from outside. Across from him was a large seat that should have been occupied by the one responsible for this chaos. But the seat was empty, devoid of everything but the cobwebs of time. No! He needs to be here! He needs to die! He noticed a stirring in the shadows far to his right. Eyes narrowed, he called into the chamber: “Where is he? Where is Galas?” “Galas?” a figure murmured from the darkness, its voice masculine, mocking. “Did you really think to find him here? To stop him thus?” “Where is he?” Desrik demanded, taking a deliberate step forward. Thunder roared from the storm outside, briefly shaking the keep’s walls as if to accentuate the intensity of his fury. “He is not here, but it would please him to know that it was you who had come for him.” The mockery was thick now, full of caustic amusement. “The greatest of the knights, their champion, now reduced to something no better than Galas himself. How painfully…tragic.” Desrik knew he was being baited to anger, but knowledge was no longer strong enough to save him. He felt his inability to resist his outrage. “We are nothing alike! He wandered from the path, broke his oaths.” “Yes, he is Fallen, and now so are you.” Desrik faltered, becoming again aware of the blood sullying his hands and body. It is true, he admitted to himself. I am now among the Fallen, the shamed and forsaken. He swallowed into a dry mouth, feeling the

weight of his trials, of mistakes made because he trusted too much. “You are abandoned now, alone,” the figure snarled from the shadows. “No longer are you a tool of Heaven’s justice.” Desrik’s eyes went to his sword, the last remaining symbol of his affiliation with the Drudwyn. The last testament to the person he once was, the hero he had been. That person deserved more than to fade away into misery and darkness. That person deserved to be avenged, to avenge all those who had suffered and lost. “If I am no longer the tool of justice, then you may regard me as the sword of vengeance,” he hissed, just before launching himself into the shadows. The figure reeled back, revealing himself to dim light as another man shrouded in the same outfit as previous adversaries. His sword darted up in answer to Desrik’s advance, and soon the two were joined in the savagery of unbridled violence. Around and around they moved, their bodies intertwining and undulating as hungry swords flashed dangerously close to tender flesh. Desrik dipped his sword low, attempting to trap the other’s blade within the triangular points of his crosspiece, but his adversary was wary and quick. The other man neatly avoided the ploy and spun around, bringing his sword around in a slash for the knight’s head. Desrik dropped to his left and twisted his body, snapping a foot out at his opponent’s shins. The other man tripped but met the floor in a fluid roll and sprang back up, twirling as he leapt and smashing a foot into Desrik’s chest. The knight stumbled back into an old statue, the impact raining a cloud of dust down over his shoulders. Shaking his head, he brought his enemy within his sights and narrowed his eyes, preparing himself for another clash. Yet, instead of charging at him, he noticed that the other man was staring past him, towards the doorway. Desrik cautiously moved away from the statue, stealing a brief glance at the door. A second figure stood there, dressed identically to the first, all but eyes hidden beneath hood and mask. “Tell me,” the first man said, his voice smug, “how did it come to be that the Drudwyn’s greatest knight was unable to protect the Iridanian princess in his care? Getting to her was surprisingly easy.” Aricia. He was being baited again he knew, but he was unable to stop the flood of pain and grief that washed over his heart. I cared for her. She loved me… The pain of memory brought with it fresh rage, and he no longer cared for caution. This man simply did not deserve to even speak of the princess. He ran forward, his sword spearheading his charge. His enemy expertly spun to the side, parrying Desrik’s assault. “How was it so easy to get past you?” he persisted with his verbal torment. “How did you fail with so little difficulty?” Because I loved Shareena. I was distracted, foolish. He couldn’t help but think of the poor peasant girl he had helped on his first journey to Iridan, how she had indebted herself to his service despite his protests. Over time, he had found himself charmed by her shy mannerisms, by her modesty and subtle beauty. Because of that, he had failed in his duty to protect Aricia, and an assassin of this wretched place had gotten to her. (Read the exciting conclusion in our next TOUGH LIT. issue!) Faraz Gafoor is a MBA graduate who has worked as a proofreader for textbooks and in the tourism industry. He’s harbored an intense passion for writing since his childhood and it’s always been his dream to entertain readers with his stories and characters. A number of his pieces have been received enthusiastically from various writing communities.

TOUGH LIT. II

AFTAW SPECIAL

First Date

by Sharon McGregor

Our Valentine’s Day offering!

Joyce dabbed her lips lightly with a napkin. “That was an excellent dinner, Andrew.” She looked around the hotel dining room. “I don’t think I’ve ever been here before.” “Neither have I. I thought I’d try someplace new for our first date. You know – new beginnings.” He smiled into her eyes as he reached out to touch her hand where it lay on the table. Not a grab, she appreciated that- just a gentle touch and then he moved his hand. The location was actually on the con side when she’d made her list trying to decide whether to come or not. The idea of a dining in a hotel where he could have booked a room and made the assumption they’d adjourn upstairs had made her definitely nervous. “Not on a first date,” she said to herself. Especially not a date she had met on-line. That was something new for Joyce but it seemed all the men she met or worked with were either driven and career oriented or juvenile; no inbetween. Now she thought maybe she’d made the right choice. Andrew was charming, courteous and a lively conversationalist. So far, he’d made all the right moves. Even if he had booked a room upstairs on the offchance, didn’t it just show confidence and resourcefulness? She could (and would) always say no. She pushed her half-eaten cheesecake aside and took a sip of excellent coffee. Then she grabbed her handbag. “Excuse me for a moment, will you Andrew?” She smiled. “You know. Ladies’ Room.” He half stood as she walked across the restaurant, an admiring expression on his face as he took in her rear profile. Joyce checked her make-up in the mirror, touching up her lipstick. She slowly became aware of the unwavering gaze of the woman at the next sink. She turned and examined the beautiful red-head who never flinched in her bold look. She lifted her eyebrow in an inquiring gesture. “You’re sitting at the far table by the window.” The red-head made it sound like an accusation. “Yes.” She drew out the word, wondering where this was going. “How long have you known Paul?” “Paul? His name’s Andrew, and I don’t think that’s any of your business.” “For your own good, I’m going to make it my business. You met on-line right?” Now Joyce began to feel a stirring of nervousness. Was this an old flame come to disrupt the date with a scene? But Paul? She must have the wrong person. “No, it’s the same man”, said the red-head. She seemed to guess what she was thinking. “He told you he likes classic cars, right? And collects original folk records?” Now she gave the red-head her full attention. Andrew had seemed honest and straightforward. Name changing was a definite confidencebuster. “If I were you, I’d walk out the door when I had a chance.” The redhead pressed on. “I wish I had. If I were a little braver, I’d bare enough to show you the bruises. Never let him get you alone. He likes it rough. Maybe you do too?” Now it was her turn to lift the eyebrow questioningly. “If not, run for the hills.” “But my coat- it’s on the seat.” “Come back later for it- they’ll leave it in Lost and Found. Look, there’s a back door. You have your purse. Make your move.” Joyce thought for a second, but all her original fears about the on-line dating made the story a plausible and a fearsome one. She grabbed her purse and slipped out the back exit. The redhead slowly crossed the room to the window table in the corner. “Hello, Andrew,” she breathed huskily, “Remember me?” “Glenda! What are you doing here?” Andrew pushed his chair further into the corner.

VOL 6, ISSUE 2

“Checking up on you darling.” Glenda slipped into the chair beside Andrew and gently ran her hand over his knee. “You didn’t think you could get away from me, did you?” “What are you going to do? You’re not going to make a scene, are you?” “Not unless you want me to. I’m afraid your date has made a run for it. You do have such bad luck with your dates, don’t you?” She leaned even closer and nibbled quickly on his left earlobe. “Glenda, I think you should leave now.” “Not until you come with me, darling. You do have the room booked upstairs, don’t you?” His hand half-covered the room key beside his coffee cup. “I see you’re prepared as usual.” Glenda gave his leg a firmer squeeze and he shuddered audibly. “This one didn’t take too much convincing. Either I’m getting better or you’re losing your touch, Andrew.” “We’ve got lots of time,’ said Andrew, returning the squeeze. “The babysitter can stay till midnight.” “Let’s go upstairs, then,” Glenda stood first. “Oh, but darling, don’t forget, next time it’s my turn to have ‘the date’.” Sharon McGregor is a prairie writer who has had stories and articles appear in Fifty Something Magazine, Crime and Suspense Magazine, Great Mystery and Suspense Magazine, Lake Country Journal, Horizon and Reader’s Digest Canada.

Murder, Mayhem, and Secrets…

Bullied and attacked in the town where he’s grown up, Charles seeks respect while his twin sister Grace, a teenage beauty, craves excitement. Both tangle with the wrong sort of people for different reasons. Their workaholic dad and anxiety-ridden mother provide them little help in facing the world of teen thugs, teen druggies, and teen rapists. The family saga includes the over- the- top antics of an older golden boy brother and a younger dare- devil brother who have their own challenges to face in this Southern mill town, the fictional Hopkinsville. Murder, mayhem, and secrets galore threaten to tear the Moore family apart when Charles realizes he is the only one who can save Grace from her murderous boyfriend and keep his family intact as each member teeters on the brink of disaster. To place your order for this exciting new novel, visit the Comfort Publishing website at www.comfortpublishing.com. Also available on Amamzon.com

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Machinima is computer-generated story telling using computer game animation found in both console and online games. Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s a graphic novel in action!

See the SciFi saga of Lieutenant Maverick Burke, who awakes from cryogenic sleep to find no operating crew and the ship in the hands of a pirate clan. The ex- special ops officer finds himself responsible for the remaining passengers of Colonial Transport AV451 and the dark secret it holds. Aching to be back in the fight again and unable to pass up a challenge, Burke takes his new responsibility seriously in this dark set up to Series 2.

Go to: http://av451.com

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