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Water Wings “Let go,” he said. He trusted his water wings as much as he trusted me in the deep end under the lifeguard stand. I wasn’t sure I heard him right. There was so much noise around us. Splashing, water falling, kids screaming. I wasn’t sure I wanted to hear him right. He was
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“How are you?” she asked. That’s always a loaded question. Who asks it gets a different version of the truth of it. The answer is most usually the first lie of the day. “Fine.” I’m scared. I’m worried for my life. I am worried for my son’s life. He’s working on his master’s in grad
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She waited… Margo kept thinking to herself, “I waited, but I don’t think it was long enough, or maybe I was on the wrong track. That must’ve been it. I was on the wrong track. I know I got the trains mixed up.” She wept. She sat on her suitcase on the platform and just
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“Hello.” I heard it plain as day. I knew right then it was coming back to the house from the storage facility. I took a pickup truckload of stuff to my building, in the rain and brought back a Ouija Board. “Hello,” it said again, louder this time. I knew where it was and
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“Stop, I lost my shoe,” Bonnie said. She was crying. It was pitch dark and we were in the middle of a flower bed in somebody’s front yard. There were four of us. Bonnie was the tiniest five year old I knew. She looked about three and was just as annoying. None of us wanted
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The Bad Seed I still can’t watch The Bad Seed without getting the heebie jeebies. The first time I saw it, I was about ten years old, and it was a Saturday after the cartoons had all gone off. Mom was busy doing mom things, the brothers and sisters were gone, maybe everyone was. But
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I finished it. I finished Norris Lives, a 25K word sequel to Norris Tales, the Adventures of an Awful House Cat. I sent it off to a publisher. Norris draws first blood. He is a jewel thief. He steals the remote as well as little kid’s lunch money. He cheats at cards and loves a
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Janet stood in front of the mirror and admired herself. The twenty-pound weight loss looked good in the deep red velvet dress she wore. It hugged her waist, plunged at the neck, and flounced from a complete circle to the floor. It was the dress of her dreams, and she was stunning. She twirled in
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“I’ve taken my typewriter to the hospital with me for kidney infections. I have taken it on camping trips, and the sand has gotten in the keys. It is just like the most fierce habit you can imagine. It is there, and it stares at you like a conscience.” ~ Erma Bombeck I must write.
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Two
People transmit emotions, alternating and direct current, twins’ feelings bloom at the same, for the same reasons, from different sources. I don’t know what kind of magic is in a twin, but I know there’s more power in it than science can explain. Ask other twin moms. I’ve watched this “thing” happen throughout their twenty-some Read more
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Jewels of the Day
Treasure of the Day Tableware is fun. Individual salt and pepper shakers for everybody at the table, pairs of cut crystal tall martini glasses, and a genuine Disney mug come in handy for the soirees in my mind as well as daily use. That says something about me, I’m sure. I schooled the boys on Read more
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Ode to the Phone
My brain flipped on the teacher switch last week. Summer perished. I mourn summer in my heart with chains of paperclips and blocks of staples. Cold fluorescent lights took the place of the sunlight filtered through the windows in the family room. I’m heartbroken. I’m back to monitor halls of chaos, angst, anger, and hormones. Read more
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Cookies and Omens
Benji told me every thunderstorm in the middle of winter was an omen. So when the lightning knocked the power out on New Year’s Eve, and he missed the cake stand, the fruitcake cookies went flying from here to kingdom come, my knees went weak just a little. Charlie Mae was exacting revenge at my Read more
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Local Pizza
Local Pizza I’m lucky. I live in small town West Virginia and a half a mile from a glorious, honest to God Italian pizza parlor, Larobi’s Pizza. The only Italian place this side of Ona that’s not a chain. Larobi’s takes cash and they don’t deliver. Their dining room is almost as good as their Read more
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Water Wings “Let go,” he said. He trusted his water wings as much as he trusted me in the deep end under the lifeguard stand. I wasn’t sure I heard him right. There was so much noise around us. Splashing, water falling, kids screaming. I wasn’t sure I wanted to hear him right. He was
-
“How are you?” she asked. That’s always a loaded question. Who asks it gets a different version of the truth of it. The answer is most usually the first lie of the day. “Fine.” I’m scared. I’m worried for my life. I am worried for my son’s life. He’s working on his master’s in grad
-
She waited… Margo kept thinking to herself, “I waited, but I don’t think it was long enough, or maybe I was on the wrong track. That must’ve been it. I was on the wrong track. I know I got the trains mixed up.” She wept. She sat on her suitcase on the platform and just
-
“Hello.” I heard it plain as day. I knew right then it was coming back to the house from the storage facility. I took a pickup truckload of stuff to my building, in the rain and brought back a Ouija Board. “Hello,” it said again, louder this time. I knew where it was and
-
“Stop, I lost my shoe,” Bonnie said. She was crying. It was pitch dark and we were in the middle of a flower bed in somebody’s front yard. There were four of us. Bonnie was the tiniest five year old I knew. She looked about three and was just as annoying. None of us wanted
-
The Bad Seed I still can’t watch The Bad Seed without getting the heebie jeebies. The first time I saw it, I was about ten years old, and it was a Saturday after the cartoons had all gone off. Mom was busy doing mom things, the brothers and sisters were gone, maybe everyone was. But
-
I finished it. I finished Norris Lives, a 25K word sequel to Norris Tales, the Adventures of an Awful House Cat. I sent it off to a publisher. Norris draws first blood. He is a jewel thief. He steals the remote as well as little kid’s lunch money. He cheats at cards and loves a
-
Janet stood in front of the mirror and admired herself. The twenty-pound weight loss looked good in the deep red velvet dress she wore. It hugged her waist, plunged at the neck, and flounced from a complete circle to the floor. It was the dress of her dreams, and she was stunning. She twirled in
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“I’ve taken my typewriter to the hospital with me for kidney infections. I have taken it on camping trips, and the sand has gotten in the keys. It is just like the most fierce habit you can imagine. It is there, and it stares at you like a conscience.” ~ Erma Bombeck I must write.
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My Mother’s Ghost
When I open my mouth, I’m shocked that I hear my mother. I hear her voice, her words, but more than that, her attitude. I hear her cadence in my speech and the philosophy I bucked as a child and an adult. She drove me crazy with her notions of what I should and should…
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My Desperate Zoo
Mothers run a desperate zoo. That’s why we plant flowers. I have a flat and a half of red, fuschia, and orange impatiens on my back porch waiting to dot the ground with their hues. My mom planted flowers, her mom planted flowers, and that’s how she died, weeding her Touch-Me-Nots. Grounds beautification 101, we…
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Ancient Days
“In those days, in those distant days, in those ancient nights stories were told before there were things to tell stories about, Mom,” Sugar said over her shoulder as she walked out the door and slammed it. “I’m sick of your stories, you tell stories like all the damn time like I’m supposed to learn…
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Rocky
“Will you go out with me?” He had the confidence of a lion, and looked like a giraffe in red school boy glasses. Red rimmed uber cool school boy glasses, worn by the king nerd of all nerds. He would never have the ability to wear a straight tie, it wasn’t in his DNA. God…
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Red Shoes
Bells chimed when I opened the door to the shoe shop. “Tips for a Tattoo,” were the words in calligraphy on the vase beside a picture of a rose. The gussied up jar had its own table with a white linen tablecloth in the center of the room, under a spotlight, no less. Very fancy…
Devonne Brown 