Selected Works from the Alabama Writers` Conclave

Selected Works from the Alabama Writers’ Conclave
2015
Literary Competition
www.alalit.com
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ALALITCOM
© 2015
Authors retain all rights
Editor
Marian Lewis
Cover: A Fairhope pier on a misty morning
(Digital photograph by the editor)
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The Alabama Writers’ Conclave (AWC) proudly presents the
2015 ALALITCOM
Now in its 92nd continuous year since inception, the Alabama
Writers Conclave met for a third time on the Fairhope Campus of the
University of South Alabama. Attendees enjoyed the Banquet address
delivered by Keynote Speaker and noted novelist, Sena Jeter Naslund, and
informative conference sessions including fiction, poetry, and nonfiction.
The annual conference and associated writing contest remain true
to, and fulfill, the original AWC mission statement of “promoting
fellowship, providing an opportunity for improvement of the writing craft,
and supporting Alabama writers.1” Each year, the AWC sponsors the
annual writing contest, which is open to writers in Alabama, as well as
those across the United States and abroad.
The contest provides an avenue for self-expression, imagination, and
creativity for both aspiring and seasoned writers. Membership in the AWC
is not a prerequisite for submitting to the contest. Winners in each of the
contest categories are afforded the opportunity to publish their winning
piece in the Alalitcom, the official journal of the AWC, published online
after the annual meeting. The awardees in the six contest categories are
shown in the Winners List at the end of the Alalitcom.
Congratulations to the 2015 contest winners. As always, each story,
article, poem and novel chapter entered into the AWC contest represents
a writer's creativity and honor of the craft; thus every participant is a
winner. I hope you enjoy the 2015 ALALITCOM.
Marian Lewis, Editor
____________________________________
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Raecile Gwaltney Davis, Giant Sages of the Pen: A Narrative History of the Alabama Writer's Conclave,
1923-1946, (Alabama: R.G. Davis, 1993)
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Title
Author
Page
INTRODUCTION
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DAPHNE WONDERS (P)........................Mickey Cleverdon…….…….
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RETURNING (FF)……….…………….…….Larry Wilson…………………
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A MIND-BOGGLING MEDEVAC
MISSION (CNF)……………………………...Robert B. Robeson………….
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ECDYSIS (SS).......................................Carol Robbins………………..
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THE BRIDGE OF SIGHS (FNC)………..…Linda Triegel………………..
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THE SUPER COCKROACH (JF)…..........Philip L. Levin...................
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RESURRECTION (SS)……………….…….Richard Perreault……….....
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THE HOUSE PHONE NEVER
RINGS (FF)……………………………………Sylvia Williams Dodgen…
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HAIBUN: JOURNEY HOME (P)………….Kathleen Thompson……….
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NIGHT OF FOOLS (CNF)…....................Linda Hudson Hoagland…
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SHATTERED LIVES (FNC)………………..Philip L. Levin…....…....…..
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COVENANT (P)…………….………………..Faith Garbin………………...
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LIAR (SS)…………………………………..…Heather Clift……….……….
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REMAIN A MEMORY (FNC)…………..….Laura McNeill………………..
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SHACK-UP KIT (FF)……………..………...Carol Robbins.……....……...
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RED LIPSTICK BLUES (JF)……………..Jane Sasser.........................
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NEWS ITEM (CNF)......……………………Richard Key……………….….
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LIKE IRON AND DIRT (FF)………………Jackie Romine Walburn…... 83
HOW I LEARNED ABOUT SEX (CNF)….Faith Garbin………….……...
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THE QUEEN V (CNF)……………………....Carol Robbins………….……. 88
RETURN TO PALMYRA (P)……………....Katherine Nelson-Born….... 94
2015 Contest Winners List………………………………………………..
(P= poetry, FF= flash fiction, SS= short story, FNC= first novel chapter,
JF= juvenile fiction, CNF= creative nonfiction)
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Poetry
Mickey Cleverdon
And yet, how might
it have been as laurel tree,
how might it feel, roots sprouting
from my feet, arms limbs, fingers leaves,
watered by underground streams,
fed from the rich earth?
Would I hate my toughening skin,
or more feelingly incorporate
sunlight, wind, and cold,
drinking rain and mist.
Might I fear the dark?
When the metamorphosis began,
Would I have taken
a sadistic pleasure
in Apollo’s warm insistence,
his desperate hands reaching,
touching, not my body,
but unrelenting wood?
I might sing with birdsong,
but live without dancing? Never.
Crete is home now,
the summer soltice returns.
I’m satisfied to sway enraptured
at mother Gaia’s altar.
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________________________________________________________________________
Mickey Cleverdon and her artist husband John have retired from teaching and live
on Mobile Bay. We collaborated on a chapbook, Questions of Form published by Slo Loris
Press. Mickey’s poems have appeared in Negative Capability, Penumbra, Whatever
Remembers Us: An Anthology of Alabama Poetry, and Literary Mobile.
~~~~~~
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Flash Fiction
Larry Wilson
My daughter, Diane, was beautiful, even in an Army uniform.
There was a wrongness about it though. I wanted her to be wearing a
wedding dress, a business suit, or a bikini on the beach. But fate is fickle
and a break up with her fiancé and a smooth talking recruiter conspired
to put her into an Army uniform.
“Dad, you served, my brother served, now it’s my turn,” she said.
I wanted to beg her not to join. Her mother did, but it hadn’t
mattered.
We’d trekked to the airport and clustered behind the security
check bidding our farewells. She gave a wave and a smile and walked
away down the corridor where we could never follow. Her mom cried
fitfully. I was able to hold back until a blanket of darkness hid my tears.
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Daughters aren’t supposed to go to war. Daughters should marry well
and give us beautiful grandchildren to spoil.
Our son had gone to the same war and returned without a scratch,
just as I had from my war. However, he was forever changed, just as I
was. No one is ever the same after they take a human life and I saw in
his eyes the same haunted look I’d brought back from Vietnam.
Today we stand in the same airport. Diane is on the plane pulling
up to the gate, back from her war. It was not what she expected. Her emails had quickly fallen to the depths of despair.
“This is a terrible place,” she wrote. “The people are so poor they
wear hunger like a jacket. Women are treated horribly yet they stare at
me with a hate that is beyond comprehension. Why we are here is no
longer clear. I once thought my country could do no wrong. I’m not sure
now and the uniform no longer makes me proud.”
My wife grips my hand and cries. My son leans against the wall
and stares at the floor, his fingers toying with an unlit cigarette. The
ground crew pushes a mobile stairway against the plane and the
passengers walk down into the sunlight, some shading their eyes, and
hurry into the terminal. To the rear, next to the cargo door, a cluster of
soldiers wait patiently as the luggage is unloaded. When all the
belongings of the living are taken care of, a flag-draped coffin is lifted off
and the soldiers carry it to a hearse. Tears pour down my cheeks as the
doors are closed and the hearse drives away.
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We were told Diane is in that coffin, but there will be no viewing.
What remains of her is not for the eyes of family. She was standing
beside a suicide bomber who hated Americans so much he gave his life to
take hers and those of several more soldiers.
The government has assured us my daughter has been properly
prepared for burial and dressed in her Army uniform.
God bless America.
________________________________________________________________________
Larry Wilson is a retired Air Force Officer who lives on the lip of the Wetumpka
meteor crater overlooking Montgomery. He is a member of several creative writing groups
and past president of Montgomery Creative Writers. He writes primarily short fiction, but
if sufficiently depressed, an occasional poem sneaks out.
~~~~~
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Creative nonfiction
Robert B. Robeson
I've always believed that there are lessons to be learned from some
of humanity's worst moments. War heads my own personal list. Armed
conflict causes its participants to reflect on the jagged landscape of the
human heart where trouble, fear, pain, bloodshed and death are a
dominate part of soldiers' daily existence.
One of these moments occurred over 45 years ago during the
Vietnam War. Hardly a day passes, since then, when one unforgettable
medical evacuation mission doesn't walk its way back through my long
and dark hallway of combat memories.
From July 1969-July 1970, I was a U.S. Army captain and medical
evacuation pilot in Da Nang, South Vietnam assigned to the 236th
Medical Detachment (Helicopter Ambulance). In that one-year tour, I flew
987 medevac missions, evacuated over 2,500 patients, seven of my
aircraft were shot up by enemy fire and I was shot down twice.
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This type of flying—most often single ship ventures—was
demanding. Our missions were flown regardless of terrain, enemy action
and weather conditions both day and night. Rapid response and en route
care could mean the difference between life and death for our patients.
The ghosts and mind-boggling memories from that conflict continue to
rattle their chains in my psyche. This was especially true of one mission
in early 1970 southwest of Landing Zone Hawk Hill, 32 miles south of Da
Nang, in the infamous Hiep Duc Valley of I Corps.
It was mid-morning and an infantry company had just been
inserted by helicopter into an area about eight miles away. Two
casualties had occurred, since the Americans had unknowingly landed in
the middle of a Viet Cong battalion headquarters. One helicopter had
been shot down by .51-caliber antiaircraft fire. The long, white mission
sheet I was handed by our radio-telephone operator (RTO) noted that a
second .51-cal was also out there somewhere. Our ground troops weren't
sure of its location. It said our patients would be situated beside this
downed bird and that's where they wanted us to land.
A medevac pilot develops a "sixth sense" after flying hundreds of
missions into similar situations. As we neared their eight-digit ground
coordinate, my eyes began taking in the terrain around the landing area.
A jungle-covered hill, jutting hundreds of feet high, was located to the
west of the downed helicopter. If I'd been the enemy, I'd have put a .51cal on that hilltop. Should my guess be correct, I knew our best
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opportunity for survival would be to fly under it and risk small arms fire
over a broader area. This enemy gunner wouldn't be able to hit what he
couldn't see.
My copilot identified the correct color of a smoke grenade the
ground troops threw out to mark where the wounded were waiting. This
smoke also showed us the wind direction. That's when I dumped the
aircraft's nose and began a diving and twisting tactical approach from
2,000 feet toward the west side of this hill. We hit the deck in a flash and
I leveled off at 120 knots a few feet above a small stream that ran
beneath this ridge and into the landing zone.
I kept the body and skids of our bird below the level of the trees.
Our rotor blades grazed the treetops on each side of the streambed.
That's when things took a drastic turn.
"We're taking fire!" our medic said, keying his mike switch behind
me. "We're taking hits!"
We were committed, as far as I was concerned, and there would be
no turning back. Enemy small arms fire continued to erupt on all sides
as we barreled into a large clearing. I performed a "hot," 180-degree turn
from 120 knots, pulling "G" forces—that we constantly practiced to save
precious time—and stopped at a three-foot hover pointed in the direction
we'd come in.
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I could now hear both incoming enemy fire and outgoing covering
fire. A few seconds elapsed as four crouching infantrymen hurried toward
us with their twin burdens of humanity.
"Get out of here, Six-Zero-Five!" the infantry RTO shouted into our
headsets. "Incoming! Incoming!"
I heard and felt the "whoomp" of the first mortar round as it hit not
far behind us. Then a second one hit in front of us. I didn't intend to
hang around to see how this bracketing technique might culminate on a
third attempt.
We managed to exit this landing zone with only a few holes in the
aircraft. At 2,000 feet, I gave the aircraft to my copilot and turned to
check on our patients' injuries.
Their blood was dripping onto the cargo deck. Our medic and crew
chief were working together to stanch the flow. Both patients appeared to
be about nineteen years old. One had a sucking-chest wound. The other
sat propped in a sitting position against our Lycoming, jet engine
compartment bulkhead. His blue eyes were focused on mine and he
appeared conscious, although he had a head wound from an AK-47
round.
"Sir, we gotta hurry," our medic said over the intercom.
I nodded but instinctively knew that no aircraft in existence could
go fast enough to save him.
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This blond-headed infantryman's lips moved and he said
something to our medic. A short time later, his eyes appeared focused on
something above me that no one else could see. I'd experienced this
scene so many times before. He was no longer with us. His war was over.
I asked our medic what he'd said. His reply were words every
medevac crew could ever hope to hear.
"Sir, he said 'I knew you'd come and get me.'"
We had touched him briefly but he, in turn, would touch me for
the rest of my life. He died with an affirmation on his lips. That final
statement still haunts me to this day
What if no one had?
The following day, this same ground unit called the aid station
RTO at Hawk Hill to tell him they'd discovered tripod marks from an
enemy .51-cal on the hilltop above that landing zone. My split second
decision to fly low-level beneath that prominent terrain feature may have
saved our crew and surviving patient.
Even though the other young warrior's wound proved fatal, he was
someone's son, brother, cousin or boyfriend. It was our responsibility, on
their behalf, to take risks in an effort to give him an opportunity of being
reunited with them. But sometimes nothing we could do was able to help
keep them in the land of the living.
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His words and that mission impacted the rest of my tour. They
motivated and assured me that we'd been placed in this critical position
for a reason. People were counting on us and we couldn't let them down.
Over four decades later, and nineteen years as a medevac pilot, I
haven't forgotten that teenager or his ultimate appointment with death.
He has touched my life far more than I touched his. I will always be
inspired by his courage and those final words.
_______________________________________________________________________
After retiring from the U.S. Army as a lieutenant colonel, and a 27-plus year
military career on three continents, Robert Robeson became a newspaper managing editor
and columnist. He’s been published 865 times in 315 publications in 130 countries. Robert
has a BA in English from the University of Maryland.
~~~~~
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Short Story
Carol Robbins
She was not sure when she began to hate him. It had crept up on
her little by little until now she could hardly stand even the way he
breathed. Others probably wouldn’t have thought of him as a bad man, a
bad husband, but they didn’t know of the thousand small, hurtful acts
that slowly crushed the love she once felt for him. He belittled her, saying
harsh things that gnawed away at her self-confidence bit by bit until she
became almost grateful for the times when he ignored her, silent, sulking
over nothing.
The morning walks became her respite, a brief escape from a house
she never wanted to live in, a house that bound her to this place, this
farm. Perhaps long ago it had been someone’s dream, but never hers.
Never his, either, yet they had ended up here when his parents died.
Perhaps that’s when the insidious erosion of her spirit had begun.
The house was depressing. Cold seeped through the floorboards
and around the windows and doors in winter, chilling both bone and
soul. The stifling summer heat was just as bad, sapping her energy,
smothering her will. In spring and fall, the weather was more agreeable,
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but the faded paint and mismatched hand-me-down furniture cast a pall
of depression over the interior. The rambling, wooden farmhouse lacked
style, and over the years necessary repairs took precedent over aesthetic
updates to the house or replacement of worn-out furniture. Stepping
outside each morning was both figuratively and literally a breath of fresh
air. The walk became her daily meditation, the time to bind her wounds
and renew her spirit.
Because he was a different person when others were around, few
would have ever believed her if she said that he was abusive. In many
ways he was a good enough man. He had never laid a hand on her in
anger and he was always kind, even loving, to their children. Yet he built
an almost tangible wall between the two of them, closing her out, so that
sitting in a room with him in the evening was almost unbearable. Had
anyone told her when she was young that she could be lonelier in a room
with someone she once loved, than to be literally all alone, she wouldn’t
have thought that it were possible. But now she knew that feeling all too
well. Her loneliness increased with each evening she spent with him, the
small distance between their chairs in front of the television seeming as
wide as a continent.
With the stepping out on the stoop and closing the door firmly
behind her, she deliberately left all the unpleasantness behind. This was
her time, not to be taken up with chores or rehashing the latest
argument. She began the walks for exercise since he regarded trips to the
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gym in town as frivolous and wasteful, but gradually they became much
more, a cleansing of the mind, a time to practice awareness. At first her
discoveries, as she called them, had been almost accidental, later the
appreciation for the smallest of things became her quest. She began to
collect acorns, a magnolia pod, an unusual twig, or other treasures that
she placed in the window sill above the sink, marveling at nature’s
patterns as she washed dishes.
She was almost to the trail through the trees when she saw it. It
was the outer layer of the skin of a snake, or shed, as the locals called
them. She’d found the sheds before, but never one as intact as this one.
She knelt beside it, entranced by its complexity. It was all there, the
fragile shell, each keratin scale now fully defined, the rectangular ones
from the belly, the smaller, rounder ones from the back, the intricate
placement of the ones on the head. She could imagine the snake slowly
breaking free, slithering out through the mouth, leaving behind the tight
casing that had confined it. Fascinated by earlier sheds, she found a
book in the library on a trip to town. Although locals called it molting,
ecdysis was the word the book used. She’d written down the word
derived from ancient Greek, and that it meant ‘to take off’ or ‘strip off.’
The little piece of paper lay folded in the bottom of her lingerie drawer,
her only private place. From time to time she unfolded the worn scrap,
tracing the word with her finger, trying to imagine what her life would be
like if she could strip off all the old and leave it behind.
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The shed was colorless and almost transparent, the life gone from
it, nothing left but a hollow shell, a faint reminder of what had once
been. Her chest tightened, but she suppressed the scream that almost
rose to her throat as the sensation of being bound and unable to grow
swept over her like a wave of pain. She shivered, not from the gentle
spring breeze. How had she allowed herself to be trapped in this place,
unable to leave behind the empty shell she had become? She rose, wiping
away tears.
Just before she turned to return to the house, something caught
her eye. The snake. She stood very still, hoping not to alert it to her
presence. She remembered the caution she’d learned as a child. “Red
touch yellow, kill a fellow. Red touch black, good for Jack.” Its brilliant
red bands were separated from equally brilliant yellow bands by narrow
black ones, so instead of the dangerous Coral snake that it sometimes
mimicked, this was a harmless Scarlet snake. Because these snakes
were rarely seen, usually hiding underground or beneath logs or a leaf
pile, sighting it seemed almost like a sign, a good omen, to her. She
watched in wonder as with each sinuous serpentine movement it moved
forward, its new skin glistening, so beautiful that she caught her breath.
Reluctantly she turned back to the house. He would be gone until
later, so at least she could listen to her favorite Mozart CD, without his
derisive comments about her “high-falutin’ airs,” while she began the
never-ending chores: preparation for the next meal, laundry that always
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needed attention, clothes well past their prime that needed mending,
omnipresent dust, and worn floors that never seemed clean despite how
often she mopped. In the living room she drew back the heavy curtains
and opened the windows, inviting the spring breezes and sunlight inside.
With renewed energy and purpose she buffed the scarred wood tables
with lemon-scented polish and rearranged the drab furniture.
From the cedar chest—the hope chest that her grandmother had
given her before she married—she retrieved a colorful throw and draped
it on the sofa. The combination of red, yellow, and black colors were still
bright after being hidden away for years. He’d constantly complained
about it when her grandmother gave it to her, calling it useless, gaudy,
and the ugliest thing he’d ever seen, when she had thought it cheerful
and lovely. Eye of the beholder, she supposed.
Standing back to survey her work, she smiled. In the morning sun,
the threads of the silken fabric shimmered like the scales of the snake,
fresh and new.
________________________________________________________________________
Carol Robbins writes from her home in Montgomery, Alabama. Like others in her
family, she feels that any personal story is worthy of embellishment. The memoir for her
mother, V. B. R.: My Mother's Story, was published in 2014. Follow Carol's blog,
Scribblings at www.carolrobbins.blogspot.com.
~~~~~
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First Novel Chapter
Linda Triegel
Chapter One: Venice, 1848
He stopped, panting, and looked back down the narrow alley. He
had outdistanced them, he thought, but he stood still lest he give himself
away by some movement or sound.
Marco Fabriano glanced up and cursed the moon. Every roof tile,
every stone in the building on the opposite side of the narrow little canal
was visible in its light, the light that had made it impossible to escape his
pursuers in the large squares and streets. He had had to seek out the
shadows at an hour when the whole city should have been in shadow.
Except in the Piazza San Marco, of course, which had been bright
with torchlight and loud with cheers for the Venetian speakers and jeers
for their Austrian overlords, who had only stood by sullenly, waiting for
any excuse to break up the demonstration.
When his breathing became more regular, Marco sighed and rested
his back against the carved wooden door of the building behind him. He
could no longer hear the footsteps. He had lost them. In the silence, a
slight movement made him look down. A cat was curling itself around his
feet, purring in supplication. He reached down to scratch its ear.
“I’m sorry, gatto. I have no food for you tonight.”
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The cat seemed to understand and, with the feline equivalent of a
shrug, padded away again. Marco moved back out into the moonlit path
and walked at an easier pace, heading back toward the Grand Canal.
They must have given up. After all, what he had done was not so
terrible. He had only torn down their cursed flag—and why not? This
was Venice, not Vienna. Why should not the flag of the Venetian
Republic fly on the highest poles? At least as high as the Austrian
banner.
His brother, Rinaldo, had been there and had watched Marco wave
the flag victoriously in the air. The crowd had cheered, but Rinaldo had
only scowled. Rinaldo disapproved of Marco’s impulsive gestures, saying
they gained nothing and only put others in danger. Perhaps he was right.
Rinaldo would know where to look for his brother if he did not
come home by morning. He would tell Mama not to worry; he was better
at lying than Marco was.
But no, it was folly to think like that. It was Rinaldo, with his
everlasting caution, who would be caught one day, simply because he
would not be able to act quickly enough to save himself.
Marco turned into a corner and paused to gaze at the Ponte di
Suspiri, just ahead of him, glimmering in the moonlight. When he was
not being pursued by heavy-footed Austrians, Marco enjoyed his city by
moonlight, for it lent a silver sheen to her most beautiful buildings and
dropped playful spangles on the canals where the water was disturbed by
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passing gondolas. Tonight the bridge looked especially beautiful, and it
was easy to forget the origin of its name—from the sighs of prisoners
being led over it to the state prison.
Well, there would be no prison for him tonight.
Marco quickened his pace and began to whistle as he caught the
gleam of the Grand Canal ahead of him. From somewhere close by, he
thought he heard music, as if there were a party of some kind going on in
one of the nearby palaces. He could see no lights, for the walls of the
buildings along his path were high and allowed no light to emerge. It was
as if those palaces, too, were prisons, for all the sign of human activity or
emotion that penetrated their walls.
And then it happened.
He stepped out of the shadows to cross a small square and heard a
shrill, mechanical whistle. He stopped short. Then the thud of booted
feet, a familiar sound now, came from an alley off the square.
“Damn!” he muttered, then laughed. Of all the times to be caught
off guard! Another five minutes and he would have been in a gondola on
his way home.
As the sounds of running came closer—there were only two of
them, he judged—he sped off in the opposite direction, along a canal,
then into an alley and from there into a narrow street that ran along the
other side of one of the palaces he had passed earlier.
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Suddenly, he saw a light, heard music more clearly, and someone
talking. Just ahead on his left, there was a wall, with a gate in it. He
tried the gate, but it was locked. There was a tree branch hanging over
the wall just next to it. Marco put his foot on a crossbar in the gate,
hoisted himself up, and reached for the branch.
He caught it and pulled himself to the flat top of the brick wall. He
balanced there precariously for a second, then dropped into the garden
on the other side of the wall, landing on his feet like a cat.
He found himself looking into the astonished blue eyes of the most
beautiful woman he had ever seen.
**
Anna gave a startled gasp.
She had known there was a narrow street on the other side of the
wall, but it was invisible from inside the garden where she had been
walking with Rudolf. The air was not much cooler in the garden than in
the ballroom, but it was cleaner and smelled pleasantly of honeysuckle
instead of tobacco and cloying perfumes.
Rudolf’s face was paler than ever in the moonlight as he turned to
see what Anna was looking at, then quickly placed himself between her
and the intruder who had suddenly appeared not three yards from where
they had been standing.
“Guard!”
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Rudolf shouted in the direction of the house in German, then
repeated the word in Italian. The intruder cursed in a low voice and made
a move toward Rudolf, who stepped back, placing his hand on his
ceremonial sword and pushing Anna deeper into the shadows behind
them. The stranger laughed softly—at Rudolf’s dramatic pose, Anna
guessed. She wanted to see this man who dared laugh in the face of
danger, and she moved to one side to get a look at him around Rudolf’s
protective bulk.
Everything about the intruder was startling. He was taller than the
average Venetian, with broad shoulders and unusually long legs. In the
flickering torchlight, his eyes were too bright, fringed by too long, too
dark lashes. His black hair was too thick and curly, his mouth too full
and shapely, almost like a woman’s except for the shadow of dark beard
that proclaimed his undeniable masculinity. The uncertain light revealed
only the odd detail, or that was all Anna’s eye caught—the streak of dirt
on his cheek and the disarray of his clothes. There was a triangular tear
in his jacket sleeve, Anna noticed, thinking irrelevantly of how different it
was from Rudolf’s neatly pressed frockcoat. The white shirt beneath
showed through the tear.
As he looked at her, suspended for an instant in total stillness, she
saw a drop of moisture roll down his cheek. A tear? Or only a drop of
sweat, the inevitable result of the exertion of running? It held her
mesmerized for a moment.
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He was looking down at her out of those brilliant dark eyes, when
they seemed—she thought—to smile. Or was that gleam in his eyes a
reflection of his fear at being caught? Or only a reflection of the light?
She could not read it.
“Help me....”
He whispered the words, barely audibly. Only Anna heard them
before they were drowned out by the clatter of boots on the iron stairs
and the shouts of the palace guard as they burst into the garden from all
the doors leading into the house.
Like an echo, then, the gate from the street opened, and two
carabinieri ran in and seized the stranger. One of the household guards
went with them as they bustled him out into the street, and the others
banged the door shut firmly behind them. It was over in seconds.
“Are you all right, sir?” one of the guards asked Rudolf, saluting.
“Quite all right,” Rudolf said calmly.
The two guards saluted again and went back into the house to
report, Anna supposed, to her uncle. Then there was silence.
________________________________________________________________________
Linda Triegel grew up in a small Connecticut town and now lives in New
Mexico. She writes romance fiction under the pen name Elisabeth Kidd, as well as theater
reviews and travel articles—mostly because she loves going to the theater and
traveling! Linda is also a freelance proofreader and copyeditor
~~~~~
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Juvenile Fiction
Philip L. Levin
“I’ve invited you two reporters here to witness my world shattering
achievement,” Professor Beetle announced. “I’ve created a genetically
engineered super cockroach.”
Ricky Reporter and Laura Leggs glanced at each other, and Ricky
let out a guffaw. “A super cockroach? Hah! What a quack.”
“What’s so special about your cockroach?” Laura asked.
Beetle beamed with pride. “These cockroaches will save the world,
Miss Leggs. They have a ravenous appetite, able to consume most any
man-made product. Here let me show you.”
The Professor lifted a drape off of a glass cube, walls broken only
by tiny air holes on top. Inside the box a dozen huge cockroaches
scrambled over each other in the sudden light.
“Yuck,” Laura said.
“These are garbage disposal cockroaches, Miss Leggs,” Professor
28
Beetle explained. “They eat anything but glass, metal, or rock. Just let
them loose in the garbage dump and they’ll consume every bit of trash.
In a few years every family will want a pet cockroach of their own.”
The two reporters walked up to the box for a closer look. Ricky
lifted off the lid, grabbed a roach, and threw it onto Laura. “Here, Laura,
here’s a pet for you!”
Laura screamed, and, in her attempt to brush off the roach,
knocked over the box. The cockroaches scrambled across the floor and
out of sight into cracks in the baseboard.
Professor Beetle stood speechless for a moment, and then shouted,
“Look what you’ve done now, you dolts! Now you’ve destroyed the world!”
Ricky patted Professor Beetle on the back. “Oh, don’t take it so
hard, Doc. Another dozen roaches ain’t gonna make a whit of difference
in this city, much less the world.”
Professor Beetle shook his head. “You don’t understand what
you’ve done, Mr. Reporter. These cockroaches weren’t ready for release—
they’re still able to reproduce.”
Ricky shrugged. “So what’s the big deal, Doc? The world has had
roaches for millenniums.”
“Not ones that could eat anything,” the Professor said sadly as the
room went dark. “These little fellows will eat all the world’s plastics, all
our lumber, all our clothing, and all our food. I fear the crown for king of
the world has just been passed to the cockroaches.”
29
Over the next few months, civilization collapsed under the might of
the roach army. Across the continent, then, on merchant ships, across
the seas, the roaches devastated everything in their path. Neither
pesticides nor poisons seemed to slow them down. The cities became
empty shells of concrete, steel and glass. Fields of grain disappeared
overnight. Industries disappeared.
Posters appeared briefly on brick walls, “Stamp out the Roaches,”
but the roaches ate the posters. Schools taught children to jump on
bugs. Recipes for roach soup, roasted roaches, and roach pie became all
the fashion. Yet the bugs multiplied much faster than all attempts to
crush them.
Just as all seemed to be lost, the roaches died off. In a matter of a
week, the whole population of ten-inch roaches lay scattered across the
landscape, skeletons with their legs pointing to the sky.
In an exclusive TV interview, Laura Leggs presented Professor
Beetle as the savior of mankind.
“It wasn’t really that difficult,” Beetle said, modestly. “I created a
genetically engineered virus that targeted ten-inch roaches. Once
introduced into the system, one cockroach infected another, and soon
the whole planet’s cockroach supply became nothing more than roach
meal.”
“That’s amazing, Professor Beetle,” Laura said. Turning to the
camera she asked, “What will they think of next?”
30
Professor Beetle smiled. “I’m glad you asked that, Miss Leggs. I’d
like to take this opportunity to demonstrate my newest achievement.”
The camera followed him across the room to a cloth-covered box on a
table.
“Oh, no! Not again!” Laura exclaimed.
________________________________________________________________________
Philip Levin, MD, president, Gulf Coast Writers Association (www.DoctorsDreams.com) since 2005, has published twenty books and hundreds of stories and articles
in multiple genres. Combining passions for medicine, writing, and travel, he creates
marvelous children’s stories, mysteries, travelogues, and anthologies. “Shattered Lives”
will be published in his novel The Tides of Mississippi (Argus Press, winter 2015).
~~~~~
31
Short Story
Richard Perreault
The sweat of a July afternoon had turned sheetrock dust on Taylor
Wells’ face to clumps of plaster. With a hand on either side of the sink he
let his head droop, waiting for the water to turn hot. There’d be time for a
shower later, but he wanted to get cleaned up before his mother got
home from the Dollar General where she worked Tuesday and Thursday
afternoons making extra money to set aside for next spring’s Holy Land
Tour with the church.
In the living room, Taylor’s father, Cordell, was watching the 6:00
o’clock news, passing time before leaving for the third shift at the Pine
Branch #1 Mine. A reverse image of his plaster-faced son, Cordell’s own
visage had acquired a permanent coal dust patina, spider webs of licorice
running in crevices along the back of his neck and into the creases in his
ear lobes. Taylor had noted that progress through generations of Wells
men could literally be read between the lines in their faces, etched in
black and white over a hundred years hard labor, coal dust to sheetrock.
32
Taylor could hear his father talking to the television. The
newscaster had said something about Martha’s Vineyard and a naval
destroyer, so Taylor figured they were rerunning the at-sea burial of John
F. Kennedy Jr., his wife, and sister-in-law. John-John is what Cordell
called the young man, a carryover from the days of the Kennedy Camelot,
before sniper bullets, cancer, and now bad piloting had proved it all to be
every bit as fragile as lives less charmed.
The plane had gone down off The Vineyard a week earlier. Coverage
of the search and recovery had been endless. Now images of the
ceremonial ash scattering ran every half hour.
Carrying a cold, wet washcloth with him, wiping plaster from either
side of his face as he went, Taylor walked into the living room.
“You say something Pop?”
Cordell turned his head to acknowledge Taylor, though not far
enough to make eye contact.
“I said, ‘Havin’ money don’t necessarily make you smart.’ Rich
people can do stupid things same as poor people.” He gestured toward
the TV. “They spent five days and millions of dollars gettin’ those bodies
off the ocean floor so they could do what? Bury them at sea.”
Cordell turned his head again, this time far enough for Taylor to
see the scowl on his face. “You’d never see poor folks do somethin’ like
that.”
33
Gripping the washcloth tighter, Taylor took another swipe at his
face. “Well, for starters, you’d never see poor folks flying their private
planes to an ocean front retreat on Martha’s Vineyard. We have to rely on
the old tried and true ways of doing ourselves in. Car wrecks. Gun fights.
Bad booze and homemade dope.”
“You’re missin’ the point,” Cordell said, his attention back on the
TV. “A poor man would never waste the time or the money doin’
somethin’ that was already done. It’s a question of bein’ practical. A poor
man goes missing at sea, you say a few words over the water, toss some
flowers, then let the good Lord and the fishes take care of the rest.”
From outside, the crunch of tires on gravel caused both Taylor and
his father to look toward the door.
“Good,” Cordell said. “Your mother’s home. I hate takin’ out of here
without gettin’ a chance to say goodbye.”
Taylor nodded. The devotion his mother and father had for each
other after 35 years of marriage was truly admirable. There could be no
doubt Cordell and Ethel Wells were firmly entrenched in the ‘til death do
us part camp.
Once inside and welcomed home, Ethel devoted herself to getting
her husband off to work while preheating the toaster oven for the
Stauffer’s meat loaf she’d chosen for her and Taylor’s dinner. She twisted
the timer to 55 minutes.”
34
“I’ve got time for a shower before dinner’s ready, don’t I?” is all
Taylor said, already heading for the bathroom.
As he turned the hot water on he could hear the roar of the pickup
pulling out onto the flattop, taking his father to another night’s work in a
cavern so dark he’d never see the stars.
With dinner downed and on its way to being digested, Taylor and
his mother settled in front of the television to watch back-to-back
episodes of The Price is Right. Taylor knew his mother would guess things
cost less than they actually did which would set her to complaining
about how everything cost too much these days. Any expression of
Ethel’s discontent with the way things were in the larger world was
welcome. If she was complaining about something else, she was less
likely to bedevil Taylor about his own life and how he was choosing to live
it.
When the Oneida personal foot spa came up for bid, Ethel shouted
out, “Lower. No way that thing costs $49.95.”
“Higher,” Taylor said, knowing his role was to take the other side
from his mother.
As the contestants began offering their guesses, Ethel leaned
forward from her spot on the sofa, reaffirming her certainty that the price
absolutely had to be lower.
35
She waited for Bob Barker to serve up her vindication, nodding at
Taylor. “You’ll see. Lower.”
But before Bob could say a word, the foot spa vanished from the
screen; in its place the face of the nighttime news anchor out of
Lynchburg.
“We’re sorry to interrupt our regular programming, but we’ve just
received word of an explosion at the Pine Branch #1 Mine, near Wise.
There are no details available at this time.” With a taut grimness etching
his voice, the news caster concluded, “We’ll have more as the story
develops.”
The TV screen flipped back to an applauding audience, but Taylor
knew his mother no longer cared whether the foot spa cost forty-nine
dollars or forty-nine million.
For a moment, neither spoke. Then Ethel said, “I suspect folks’ll be
going to the church. We can stop by the Kentucky Fried and get a couple
of buckets of chicken on the way. I’ll take tea bags and sugar. We can
make it up when we get there.”
Taylor knew anytime the going got tough, his mother just tightened
her Bible belt another notch and plowed ahead. “Putting on the full
armor of the Lord,” she called it.
As for himself, Taylor didn’t want to go to the church, to be
swamped in the deluge of tears and the calling out to what he’d decided
was a whimsically indifferent God. But he knew his mother would want
36
him close, and in spite of their differences he felt he owed her that. And if
he were honest, he didn’t want to wait alone through the coming hours
while newscasters employing practiced foreboding dropped crumbs of
information leading to the final disclosure of the miners’ fate.
For the next few days, coverage on the local stations was
incessant, the national media frequently cutting to live reports. None of
the announcers would say as much, nor would mine officials provide the
grim prognosis, but from the beginning a shrouded certainty hung over
the smoldering shaft of Pine Branch #1 that there would be no survivors.
On the morning of the third day a reporter went so far as to
wonder out loud if the men were languishing in fear and hope, or had the
explosion killed them before they knew what had happened. With
tortured rationale he tried to make the latter sound like a blessing. By
the end of the day, rescue workers reached the seven bodies and began
the recovery.
When the news came about her husband and the others, Ethel
said it was kind of like it was with Jesus, the men having lain in their
tomb for three days before being resurrected. In her mind and heart she
wrote it down indelibly on the Lord’s Will side of the ledger, opposite the
Lord’s Blessing side where good things were inscribed.
Taylor knew this wasn’t the time to point out discrepancies to his
mother, shady edges and dismissed contradictions being essential to the
37
steadfastness of her faith, but Jesus had not been in the tomb three
days. Late Friday to dawn Sunday was maybe thirty-six hours, a dayand-a-half, tops. The miners had been entombed twice that long, and for
them there would be no resurrection.
On the day of the first funeral, a CNN news anchor who had
interviewed Ethel and made note of her Jesus in the tomb analogy
observed with pointed irony that after three days of ceaseless endeavor to
find the men and remove them from beneath the earth, the process had
begun of putting them back; back beneath the soil from which they had
taken life, and which in turn had taken theirs.
As the image of a black-veiled Appalachian widow filled the screen,
Taylor couldn’t help wondering if somewhere a rich man was watching
the story and saying, “Poor people do the stupidest things. They go to all
the trouble of getting those bodies out of the ground, and for what? So
they can put them right back in.”
________________________________________________________________________
This is the fifth straight year Richard Perreault’s writing has appeared in The
Alalitcom. His short fiction has also been honored by Appalachian Heritage Writers
Symposium, Gulf Coast Writer’s Association, and the Atlanta Writers Club. Richard lives
in Bryson City, NC, on a mountaintop overlooking The Great Smoky Mountains.
~~~~~
38
Flash Fiction
Sylvia Williams Dodgen
I wondered why mother kept the old house phone. Last spring my
brother Bob and I gave her a smart phone for her birthday, and she
became an expert as quickly as a twelve-year-old playing a new video
game. In fact her Garden Club friends counted on her to show them the
new apps she downloaded. Mother had never been one to resist change.
She had always sported the newest hair styles, fashions, and even colors,
painting the house Williamsburg blue, then yellow, salmon, lavender and
finally beachcomber beige.
Recently, mother had knee surgery. Bob and I took turns staying
with her at night and on weekends and had arranged a sitter for week
days. As she healed and her health improved, we agreed she could
benefit from an emergency call service, a lifeline. Since the house phone
never rang, we thought this was one expense she could do without. She
39
took her smart phone everywhere, but at home we were constantly
looking for it in cushions and covers and would have to call it to start it
meowing like a cat to locate it—mother said she enjoyed having a pet she
did not have to feed.
One Saturday morning Bob and I met at mother’s to replace all the
light bulbs and change the smoke detector batteries, one of which she
had punched with a broom handle until it quit beeping. We took this
opportunity to point out to her that the house phone never rang and a
good replacement for it would be a call service on a bracelet in case of an
emergency. Mother said that she might remember to wear the bracelet
but added that she still wanted to keep the house phone.
“But mother,” I said, “you really don’t need it. Bob and I call you
on your cell; the doctor’s office calls your cell. No one calls the house
phone anymore except telemarketers.”
“Well, there is our pastor. He has called me on the house phone.
And sometimes Shirley at the dentist calls the house phone. No, I can’t
do without the house phone.”
“Mother, I’ll call Pastor Jim and Shirley too. I’ll make sure they
know to call your cell.”
“No, dear, you don’t understand. The house phone is my lifeline.”
Mother said and turned away so that we would not see her tears.
40
Bob started to say that she was being unreasonable, but I
suddenly understood and held up my hand to stop him.
To mother’s frail back I asked, “We’ve had that same phone
number since Bob and I were small, haven’t we?”
“Yes, since 1968, the year your father went to Vietnam. It’s the
only number he knows. The last time he called he was on leave in
Australia. I couldn’t go. You were both so little.”
I had not realized that all these years my mother had been
waiting for a call from a husband, who was still listed MIA in Vietnam.
______________________________________________________________________
Sylvia Williams Dodgen lives in Orange Beach, Alabama. She has won awards
in the state 2012 Hackney Literary Competition in fiction, the 2014 Alabama Writers
Conclave competition for poetry, and the 2015 Alabama State Poetry Society spring
competition. An Alabama native, she received degrees from the University of Alabama.
~~~~~
41
Poetry
Kathleen Thompson
Helen’s box sits waiting unopened in my foyer since its delivery mid-afternoon by a truck from
Asheville from a house on the hill in a slight falling snow where I waited bearing a eulogy to go
to Highlands Farms, euphemism for a place people are forced to go—small rooms cram jammed
with breathing machines or memorabilia brought on Sundays for the few afternoon hours a
family member might visit and bring a note from a grandchild with balloons or a sun face where
there was little sun because the window faced north but on this snowy day in this chapel it
seemed brighter with a roomful of those residents who could actually walk, a piano for some
sacred tunes, and a minister to greet and smile and give permission for me to speak—but to make
it as brief as possible but brevity was never possible for the traveler, missing in the room; it
never was so when Helen took the floor and the room listened and listened and I was the one
wishing I had a tape recorder because as much as I loved listening I couldn’t retain it all,
couldn’t record and repeat her cadences, her modulations that made the tale like something one
might read in a hefty book of fairy tales in the upper chambers of a remote castle in an unnamed
country, like Isak Dinesen whose “speak like rain” tongue, her mellifluous tone, her syntax, so
singular it was, and no one not even the likes of a George Core was allowed to modify a word in
a sentence Helen had written but who in the room would know George Core if I related that
incident and who could understand unless they’d had lunch with her at Sinclair’s and listened to
her talk over she-crab soup for hours of the days that are no more, of Hudson Strode and his
Therese (tuh-rez), of the novel Helen wrote for him and how the whole of what she, Therese, and
her Helen’ mother knew about sex went into that novel—oh, Helen, how diminished are your
written treasures, how diminished is the writing population of Alabama, how diminished am I to
have lost such a friend whose box I must slit open to find what they’ve saved for the archives,
what mere twenty pounds of your typewritten pages are arbitrarily stacked inside a clear plastic
bag, bound and taped in bubble wrap.
The featherweight snow
has turned to ropey rain;
still a sluice of tears.
________________________________________________________________________
Kathleen Thompson holds a B.S. from the University of Alabama and an MFA in
Writing from Spalding University. Her three published books of poetry are: Searching for
Ambergris; The Nights, The Days; and The Shortest Distance. Most recently she has poems
published in PMS, poemmemoirstory, and in 2nd & Church.
~~~~~
42
Creative Nonfiction
Linda Hudson Hoagland
“Ellen!”
I woke from a sound sleep. Had I heard someone call my name?
“Ellen!”
I jump out of bed and walk to the door while I try to pull my robe
on to cover my night gown.
“Ellen, let me in,” says a voice in a loud whisper.
“Go away, Jack!” I return the whisper harshly.
“I can’t,” he answers even louder.
“Why not?”
“I can’t, that’s all!” he shouts.
I open the door slowly and see the reason he can’t go away. He is
drunk, so drunk, in fact, that he won’t be able to get back down the
steep steps that lead to my door without falling head first. I live on the
second floor of a double house with the steps that lead to my apartment
43
in the back of the house where it is dark and dangerous if you don’t
know where to walk.
“How did you manage to get yourself up the steps?”
“Just lucky, I guess,” he answers with a Stan Laurel grin on his
face.
Jack lunges forward as if he has had a miscommunication between
his brain and his legs. I reach forward and hold him upright until he can
get his legs to follow the commands of his pickled brain.
“What do you want, Jack?”
“I wanted to see you. Hic..”
“Do you have the hiccups?”
“I guess so. Hic..”
“Come on and sit down on the sofa until you sober up a bit.”
“Don’t want to get sober. I paid a lot..hic...of money for this...hic...”
“How much did you drink?”
“Don’t remember. A lot..hic...”
“Why?”
“Trying to..hic..forget.”
“Forget what?”
“You.”
My heart melts with his answer. I’m not able to forget him either
except that I’m not drinking myself to death in the process, at least, not
this time. There have been break-ups in the past, and I, too, sought the
44
liquor bottle to aid in forgetting my unhappiness and loneliness. It was
only a short-lived memory loss because when I sobered up during the
night and crawled out of bed the next morning, my unhappiness and
loneliness were still there with me and Jack was not.
Jack leans over to kiss me.
“Hic..”
I smile and gently push him away.
“Hic..”
“Hold your breath and count to ten.”
Jack does as he is told. It doesn’t work.
“Hic..”
I bring him a glass of water.
“Drink the water while holding your breath.”
Jack drinks the water.
“Hic..”
I walk out of the room and find a brown paper bag. I hold the top
so that I can blow air into the bag. I walk into the living room and pop
the bag next to Jack.
He jumps from being startled by the noise.
“Hic..”
“I don’t know what else to do.”
“Hic..neither do I.”
45
Jack grabs me and pulls me to the sofa. He kisses me hard almost
as if he were punishing me. He pushes me down on the sofa and
proceeds to climb on top of me.
“Jack, wait a minute. You’ve got to take your clothes off first,” I say
as I push against his tense body.
He fumbles around with his zipper without removing himself from
his position on top of me and starts driving against me again with his
body.
“Owwwww….” he yells as he jumps up from the sofa rubbing at his
shin.
“What’s the matter? What happened?”
“You have a broken spring. It gouged me on the leg.”
I lead him to the bedroom where I undress him and look at the
scrape on his leg.
“I didn’t tell you about the spring because I didn’t know you were
going to attack me on the sofa. I prefer the bed,” I say in a teasing tone.
I push him back on the bed and rub and caress all of the
appropriate places required to get a rise out of him.
Nothing is happening.
He is too drunk.
I pull the covers over him and let him sleep.
46
Jack gets up during the night to go to the bathroom and I lie in the
bed pretending to be asleep as I watch him try to find the bathroom. He
has put on my robe, or at least tried to put it on in his drunken stupor.
Before long the noises coming from the bathroom are loud. I hear
the cabinet door slam and water running.
He plods his way back into the bed where he removes my robe
from his drunken body and falls back onto the bed.
When I awake the next morning, Jack is gone.
I smile when my mind flashes back to the silly grin and the love he
tries to give me. I chuckle when I remember the gouge on his leg that he
will have to explain to his wife in due course.
I laugh out loud when I try to call him a fool for getting drunk and
appearing on my doorstep searching for the forbidden love from the
‘other’ woman in his life.
Then ― I become sad because we are both fools.
The chastising starts because, once again, I have allowed Jack to
return to the place in my heart that loves him and to the place in my bed
that, I fear, will always be waiting for him.
Being the ‘other’ woman is no way to live and love. I’m always
second choice and fighting for the valuable snippets of time he allows me
to have. I get angry, very angry, about being number two. Then, I
remember that number two is better than being a zero.
47
I love him so much that I’m not ready to eliminate him from my
heart. Having the resolve to hold him away from my heart and my side is
something I have not been able to pin down and claim as my own.
I will do that someday; but until then, Jack is my one true love.
Until that day comes, when this foolishness ends, the night of the
fools will be repeated.
_____________________________________________________________
Linda Hoagland, acclaimed for mystery novels including Snooping Can Be
Doggone Deadly and Crooked Road Stalker, is author of nonfiction, a collection of short
writings, and a volume of poems. Current president, Appalachian Authors Guild, she also
won a first place Pearl S. Buck Award for Social Change, and the Sherwood Anderson
Short Story Contest.
~~~~~
48
First Novel Chapter
Philip L. Levin
Chapter One
Andrew arrived on a steamy June afternoon, fresh out of the
psychiatric unit. I preceded him into my condo, holding the door as I
watched my son trudge past. His tattered T-shirt bragged of past glory, a
science fair from two years and a lifetime ago. Sullen, shallow eyes
peeked out from below his dirty bangs.
He dropped his lumpy canvas bag on the terrazzo floor and I
placed his battered suitcase beside it. Walking through the living room,
he went out on the balcony, leaving the glass door wide, the Mississippi
heat rolling in like an open oven. I came up beside him, watching him
stare out at the beach ten stories below. Laying my arm across his
shoulders, I let my hand hover expectantly above his collar, just in case.
49
“Welcome to your new home,” I said.
An occasional car passed along Beach Boulevard, beyond which
the white sands sat empty, the sun worshipers having retired for the day.
Andrew leaned out over the rail, pursed his lips, and let loose a massive
spit-bomb. We watched it plummet to the sands below.
“This freakin’ wasteland ain’t my home.”
I gripped the rail with my free hand. “Like I said on the plane,
Andy, you just have to give it a chance. I’ve grown to love the peace and
quiet. Soon you’ll be running along the beach, enjoying the sunshine and
warm weather.”
Andrew focused on his sneakers scuffing the balcony floor. “Got it
all planned out don’t you? Just start all over here, huh? No friends, no
‘hood’, no nothing. Jeez.”
We stood in silence until I could feel the sweat dripping onto my
collar and accumulating under my arms. “You want something to eat?” I
asked.
He grunted and trudged back inside, leaving the door open so that
the cool air blasted against my face. Before following him I gave one last
furtive glance over the rail, remembering Doctor Hopkin’s suicidal
warnings. In that cold Chicago Hospital lobby it had all seemed so
obvious. Get the boy out of there and everything will be fine. Now…now I
wasn’t so sure.
Inside I found Andrew staring at my bookcase. I came up and
50
pulled out Franklin Roosevelt, the War Years. “You remember this one?” I
asked. “It was the first biography you ever read.”
He shook his head. “Where’s my room?”
Stopping for Andrew to pick up his bags, I led him down the hall to
the second bedroom. I’d planned to make it into an office when I’d moved
in three months before, but besides hanging a couple of prints on the
wall, the room was unchanged from when I’d rented it. The room’s few
pieces of furniture; bed, dresser, small desk and chair, crowded the
space. After dumping his clothes into a smelly pile, Andrew threw himself
onto the bed, burying his face in the pillows.
“Welcome home, Andy,” I repeated.
He turned and sat up on the mattress edge, his face studying
mine. “Home, huh? How can this be my home? How can this ever be my
freakin’ home?”
I watched him stare out the window, wondering what turmoil roiled
inside him. People said we looked alike, but, boy, we certainly hadn’t had
the same childhood. At sixteen I was a geek, a slide-rule carrying physics
major whose biggest concern was a new zit on my nose. “I had to bring
you away. You know that. The stuff you were doing…. You just were out
of control.”
“Yeah, well, locking me up in the loony bin sure got my attention.”
He rose and walked up against the window, staring out at a landscape so
different from suburban Chicago it must have seemed a different planet.
51
The wind buffeted the glass, a whoosh, whoosh, of ghost whispers.
I watched his breath create an ethereal fog on the window. It faded.
Shadowed. Faded. “Next week you can register for your senior year. Say,
maybe they have a cross country team.”
Andrew leaned his shaggy head against the glass, his eyes fixed on
his untied tennis shoes. “Don’t care.”
I grabbed him in a hug, felt his rigid resistance, and pulled tighter.
He pried himself loose and returned to the bed, lying on his back and
staring at the slowly turning ceiling fan.
“You ever have nightmares?” he asked.
I sat, sinking into the corner of the bed. “Sometimes. More often
since the tragedy.”
“Those kids in the unit... Kidnapping. Gang Rape. Ritual Tattooing.
How the hell did I get stuck in there? Just for smoking a little pot? Jeez.”
I reached out, but Andrew pushed my hand away.
“Your life will be different now; a fresh start.”
“I belong in Chicago.”
“You almost died there.”
He turned away, balling up hard against the wall. His voice barely
leaked out. “Maybe it’d been better if I had.”
I took a moment to restart my heart, forcing away the images of the
too recent funeral. “Andy! Please!”
He remained silent and I reached out, rumpling his hair like I used
52
to do during those better times. “We can make this a happy home, the
two of us. Remember how we used to go to museums and shows? Talk
about history and politics? We can make a new life here. We have each
other, Andy. Let’s make it work.”
He covered his head with the pillow, giving him a scarecrow look,
his long legs stretched out below ragged shorts. Six months ago those
legs had been muscular, instruments for bringing home trophies. Now
they were merely padded bones.
I stepped to the door and turned. “You hungry? I’ll make up a
batch of my famous spaghetti.”
The only sound came from a seagull’s call echoing faintly through
the window.
“It’ll be ready in half an hour. If you don’t come out I’ll leave yours
in front of your door.”
Stepping into the hallway I leaned back against the closed door,
squeezing my eyes shut. I tried to make a mental list of what I needed to
do; disable Andrew’s bedroom lock, clean out the medicine cabinet, oh, a
hundred chores. I tried to pull up memories of those days when
everything was so perfect, a mere eighteen months before. But those
images wouldn’t stay, mutating into the grief and anger that had
shattered our family. Everything was gone, all but this last piece; this
last chance to salvage something of my life. How am I supposed to help
my son when I’m struggling to keep my own sanity?
53
I walked into my bedroom where I picked up the framed picture of
a younger Andrew, a smiling Andrew. I traced the photo’s edge beneath
the glass, folded to tuck away the part lost forever. Picking up this most
precious of treasures, I hugged it tightly against my chest.
________________________________________________________________________
Philip Levin, MD, president, Gulf Coast Writers Association (www.DoctorsDreams.com) since 2005, has published twenty books and hundreds of stories and articles
in multiple genres. Combining passions for medicine, writing, and travel, he creates
marvelous children’s stories, mysteries, travelogues, and anthologies.“Shattered Lives”
will be published in his novel The Tides of Mississippi (Argus Press, winter 2015).
~~~~~
54
Poetry
Faith Garbin
You swear you saw stars dancing on the ceiling;
that you smelled my perfume, sniffed again,
and it was gone. The crow on your dresser
screamed obscenities; you expected to die.
Night ends; your fever slithers away
like a snake out of Eden.
The sun licks the window panes.
You ring the bell—ask for water.
The flowers are wilted; dirt cracks beneath them.
I comb your hair, tangled like a bird’s nest,
and count your breaths with each stroke.
You eat crackers; crumbs fall on the sheets.
Let the day slip by slowly now
as nimbus clouds cling to the sky.
Remember your promise at birth—
that I will leave this world first.
________________________________________________________________________
Faith Garbin lives in Ocean Springs, Mississippi. Her work has appeared, or is
forth-coming in Health-Healing: Body in D[ist]ress, Imagine This!, Katrina Memories and
The Awakenings Review, among others. Her first poetry collection, How We Bury Our
Dead, is forthcoming with Negative Capability Press. She studied English at Virginia Tech.
~~~~~
55
Short Story
Heather Clift
She left us on a Tuesday. It wasn’t until Wednesday I realized she
was actually gone for good. It wasn’t unusual for Mama not to be home
when we returned home from school, so her absence didn’t raise any
suspicions. Casey and I went on with our regular routine without a
second thought.
The state of our tiny house upon waking each morning was my
barometer to how she was feeling. Every morning, I’d pick up any stray
clothing she may have left in her wake after stumbling in sometime
before daybreak. I’d wash all the dirty dishes, throw away empty cans
filled with spent cigarette butts, and whatever else she’d dropped and
left. In my head, I always called it her “Trail of Tears.” My little brother
wasn’t immune to the facts as we lived them, but I wanted nothing more
than for him to have some semblance of whatever defined a normal life
the other kids at eight-years-old enjoyed. One of us believed them, those
little white lies. He didn’t pick this life any more than I did.
When we walked in the door after school Wednesday afternoon, I
knew.
***
The last time I begged Gran to let us stay with her, Mama had
spent the last five days in bed, never coming out longer than to use the
56
bathroom. CPS just so happened to pay one of their infamous surprise
visits after another anonymous tip. I had called Gran in a panic. She’d
driven over and assured the officials she would take care of everything.
My mother, even with the threat of losing us, never stirred.
“Your mama, she tries hard, Miranda,” Gran said. “She’s just wired
differently than most women, you know. Just because she gets a little
down in the mouth now and again don’t mean she ain’t worth lovin.’ She
always told me you chil’ren was the best thing to ever happen to her.”
After CPS left, Gran went home and gathered up a few things,
assuring me we’d have enough to survive Mama’s spell.
“It’ll all come out in the wash,” Gran said with a smile and went in
my mother’s room and gave her a stern talking to from behind the closed
door. I couldn’t make out specific words, but the tone was unmistakable.
Gran came out of Mama’s room, smiling. “She’ll be fine. Just you
see.”
I rushed up to her. “Please, Gran. Can we just stay with you? I
promise I’ll be good. You’ll see! I can cook and clean…”
Gran cut me off, shaking her head slowly and closing her eyes. “No
ma’am. You belong here. She needs you and your brother as much as
you need her. Why would you want to live with an old lady anyway?” She
smiled and laughed at her own joke.
Gran left me standing in the middle of the living room with tears
streaming down my face. I went into the kitchen to put away what few
57
groceries she’d managed to sacrifice for us: a few dented cans of tuna,
four boxes of store-brand macaroni and cheese, an open sleeve a saltine
crackers, two ancient pints of home-canned tomatoes, and half of a box
of stale cereal. I looked at the calendar where I had big red circle around
the 10th I’d already ran up a credit down at the Piggly-Wiggly last week,
the manager making me promise I’d come back and pay when the money
came in on the food stamp card.
After getting Casey fed, bathed, and tucked into bed, I’d just
peeked on Mama again, when a soft knock at the door caused my blood
to run cold. The dim porch light just made out the outline of the sheriff
standing on the stoop holding his hat.
I’d managed to convince Mama she had to get out of bed this time.
Mama sat on the opposite end of the couch from the sheriff, and he
delivered the news Gran had been killed in a car accident.
Mama blinked twice. “Okay.” She stood and went back to her
room.
I let the sheriff out.
“You kids going to be all right?”
“Oh, yes. She’s just been down with the flu. I’ll take care of
everything.”
He handed me his card. “Call me if you need anything. Day or
night.”
58
Mama stayed in bed for three more days. I still don’t know where
Gran is buried.
For the last two years since Gran’s death, Mama said she’d work
hard on getting better, on finding a good paying job so we could move to
a bigger place. She’d have her spells now and again, but only for a day or
two, just in time to save whatever job she was working at the time,
usually waitressing at some honky-tonk, or running the cash register at
one of the truck stops in Decatur. On the rare night she was at home, I
could hear her. Deep sobs I swore shook my bed. Once, she happened to
be up the next morning after a crying spell, sitting at the kitchen table,
sipping a cup of coffee. Her threadbare robe hugged her bony frame.
“Mama, are you okay?”
She sniffed, and dabbed at her swollen, bloodshot eyes with a wad
of toilet paper. “Oh, I’m all right. Just a little lonely, you know? I was
seeing this one guy, but then I found out he was married…well, I don’t
need to burden you with my troubles. But mark my words; men will lie to
get what they want.”
“But you have me and Casey. We’ll keep you company.”
“No offense, sweets, but it’s not the same.”
I finally worked up the nerve to go into Mama’s room. I paused
before I turned the knob and pushed the door open wide. It was all
59
gone—the bed, a small dresser we’d found at a yard sale, the wicker side
table I’d found on trash day, the funky lamp we’d bought at Goodwill on
half-price day, all the pictures, mostly proofs from school portraits she
couldn’t afford. The pushpins she’d used to hang them were on the floor.
A faded piece of red construction paper in the corner caught my
attention. I picked it up and turned it over: HAPPY VALENTINE’S DAY, MAMA!
I LOVE YOU THIS MUCH! was written in my kindergarten scribble, with a
stick figure of myself holding my arms open across the page, all in black
crayon. The only thing in her closet was a lone wire hanger on the rusted
closet rod.
My head was spinning with all I’d need to accomplish. I still had a
couple of months until I turned eighteen, four before I graduated from
high school. It was going to take a miracle to keep from losing what little
Casey and I had left. I went to the kitchen to get a broom.
I heard my little brother behind me and turned around.
“Randa?”
“Yeah, buddy?”
“What’s for supper?”
“Let’s pick something out. You want to help?”
“Okay.”
I opened the fridge to grab some leftovers to warm up. A single
white envelope with my name printed on the front was propped up in
front of jar of mayonnaise. I grabbed it and tore it open.
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Dear Miranda,
Exciting news for me! I’ve got a new job but it’s up in Nashville.
Jimmy (that’s the man that got me the job) said I will be making all the
money I can stuff in my pockets. This is the chance I’ve been waiting for!
The problem is I can’t take you two with me just yet. But as soon as I get a
place we all can fit, I’ll send for you. I know you want to finish school
anyway. Here’s some money and it should be enough to pay the rent and
light bill until I get settled. I’ll send more later on. Don’t tell nobody I’m
gone.
See you soon!
Love, Mama
“What it say, Randa?”
I looked at his sweet face. A genuine smile of love and trust spread
across his freckled cheeks. “Mama says she loves us, and she’ll be back
real soon.” His smile brightened. My heart broke into a million pieces.
The lies always come easy, but living them was another story.
_____________________________________________________________
Heather Clift was encouraged to pursue writing in college and ultimately won two
awards and was published in three anthologies. "Here and Now," has been published by
Penny Shorts while additional stories are slated to appear in other publications this year.
Heather resides in Tennessee with her husband and sons.
~~~~~
61
First Novel Chapter
Laura McNeill
Chapter 1 - Allie 2016
In her final minutes as an inmate at Arrendale State Prison, Allie
Marshall’s body pulsed with tension. Eyes averted, managing any
movements with robotic precision, she remained on guard.
Only moments to go.
A sliver of time. Not even a quarter-hour. An unremarkable
measurement, when held up against the billion other moments in any
person’s natural life. But after a decade inside, those last twelve minutes
seemed the longest span in all of eternity.
To her right, rows of monitors blinked and recorded everything
across the sprawling campus in Habersham County. Though the angles
differed, the subject never changed: women in identical tan-collared
shirts and shapeless pants. Inmates on work detail, in the cafeteria, in
dormitories.
A corrections officer sat nearby, her pale blue eyes scanning the
screens. To this worker, to all of them, Allie was GDC ID, followed by ten
numbers. Nothing more. Inside the thick metal bars, Allie’s life was
suspended, a delicate fossil in amber.
Until now. Ten minutes.
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Her reflection stared back, unblinking, in the shatterproof glass
window near the door. Green eyes flecked with gold, dark blond hair
tucked in a loose ponytail, barely-visible brackets at the corners of her
lips.
Maybe, Allie thought, she’d forgotten how to smile and laugh.
Happiness seemed unreachable, as if the feeling itself existed on the
summit of an ice-tipped mountain shrouded by storm clouds. Indeed, the
rush of pure, unadulterated joy belonged only to those with freedom.
Allie’s memories of it—her daughter’s birth, Caroline’s first smile, first
steps—were fleeting and distant.
Instead, the perpetual motion of prison, the waking, sleeping, and
sameness, all blended together; like a silent, black-and-white movie on a
continuous loop.
Until the news of her parole.
At first, the concept of freedom seemed impossible—a hand trying
to catch and hold vapor. The judge sentenced Allie to sixteen years, and
she fully anticipated serving each and every one of them. She didn’t
believe she’d be granted an early release—she couldn’t—until she
stepped beyond the walls and barbed wire and chain-link fence; barriers
that kept her from everyone and everything she’d ever loved.
Allie focused on breathing, stretching her lungs, exhaling to slow
her pulse. Her own belongings, a decade old, lay nearby. Keys that
wouldn’t open doors. A watch with a dead battery. A light khaki jacket
63
with a photo of then five-year-old Caroline tucked in the pocket, one pair
of broken-in Levis, and a white cotton shirt. Gingerly, with her fingertips,
she reached for the clothing, then gripped the bundle tight to her chest.
A second guard motioned for Allie to change quickly in a holding
room. With the door shut, she pulled the shapeless prison garb over her
head and picked up the shirt. The material, cool and light, brushed
against her skin like gauze. Allie shivered.
For ten years, all she’d known was the rasp of her standard-issue
navy jacket, the scrape of her worn white tennis shoes along the
sidewalk.
Back in Brunswick, Allie had filled her closet with easy summer
shifts and crisp linen pants. Now, her body was different, too—the soft
curves and hips had dissolved—leaving lean muscle behind. The jeans
hung loosely around her waist and hips. The top billowed out in waves
from her shoulders.
Nothing would fit, she reminded herself. Not much in her past life
would.
And that was all right.
When she walked out of Lee Arrendale State Prison, home to
thousands of female inmates, Allie didn’t want reminders. No indigo
tattoo inked down her back or neck. No numbers or symbols etched into
her arms or fingers. The only faint, external evidence of time served was
a faint scar that traced her eyebrow.
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The real proof of her internment lay underneath it all. Below the
seashell white of Allie’s skin, hidden in blood, tendons, and muscle, the
experience indelibly marked on her soul. An imprint made by incident,
mistake, and tragedy.
Evidence, and lack of it.
I’m innocent, she’d insisted to everyone who would listen. Her
lawyer fought hard, rallied a few times, but in the end, the jury convicted
her. Voluntary manslaughter.
A year later, Allie’s appeal failed. Then money ran out. Her father
turned his attention back to his veterinary practice after his cardiologist
warned the stress of another trial might kill him. Her mother and sister
did their best to raise Caroline.
And there was Ben. Sweet, thoughtful Ben. The man who’d wanted
to marry her, who said he would love her always. At the time, she’d
pushed him away. Broken his heart by rejecting his proposal, and he’d
left. Allie closed her eyes. She’s convinced herself it was the logical thing;
what made sense. She hadn’t done her best to forget him. It hadn’t
worked in the least.
The days and months blurred. Entire seasons dissolved, shapeless
and gray, like the ink of fine calligraphy smeared by the rain.
The squawk of the prison intercom barely registered in Allie’s
brain. Sharp insults and threats were routine, eruptions of violence
expected. Even along the brown scrub grass and wooden benches of the
65
prison yard, there was no escape. Allie always tried to disappear—
pressing her body close to the concrete walls, becoming a chameleon
against the barren landscape.
The women in Arrendale weren’t afraid of punishment; most had
nothing left. Some bonded with other inmates for sexual favors; others
cut their hair short and took on male stud personas. Gangs ruled.
Prisoners paid for protection with cigarettes, food, and stamps.
Allie had watched a woman almost bleed to death, stabbed in the
jugular with a plastic fork in the lunchroom. A fellow inmate in her
dormitory was choked to death, purple fingerprints visible on the
woman’s throat when the guards discovered her body. Another girl, only
19, tried to hang herself with a scrap of fabric.
Despite it all, Allie had survived.
In another few minutes, her younger sister, Emma, would arrive,
as bus service didn’t run from Alto to Brunswick. Tomorrow, she’d meet
her parole officer at noon. And like every parolee, she would receive a
check, courtesy of the Georgia Department of Corrections, for the grand
total of twenty-five dollars.
Allie blinked up at the clock, almost afraid the time might start
going backward. She forced her eyes away, squeezed them shut. If she
tried hard enough, her mind formed a picture of her grown daughter’s
face. In her daydreams, she’d imagined their reunion a million times,
rehearsed every possible scenario. She worried about the right words to
66
say, how to act, and whether it was all right to cry. The enormity of it
was impossible to contain, like holding back the ocean with a single
fingertip.
All that mattered now was seeing Caroline.
The buzzer sounded long and loud; its vibration shook the floor.
The burly guard sighed and lumbered to her boot-clad feet. She stood
inches from Allie’s shoulder, her breath hot and rank from a half-eaten
roast beef sandwich.
Locks clicked and keys rattled. The barrier, with its heavy bars,
groaned under its own weight. An inch at a time, the metal gate heaved
open. Soon, there would be nothing but empty space standing between
Allie and the rest of the world.
She felt a nudge.
In that moment, Allie heard four words, precious and sweet.
“You’re free to go.”
As the gate closed behind her, Allie blinked, her eyes adjusting to
the bright blue midday sky. Heat rose in waves off the blacktop. Sunlight
reflected from windows along the campus.
Standing outside the gates of Lee Arrendale was surreal. Allie
thought about running, maybe all of the way to Brunswick. She would
sprint until her lungs burst and her heart exploded, feeling the rush of
wind on her cheeks, putting miles between her and the prison.
67
Of course, she didn’t have to run. Her sister stood there, waiting.
Lithe and slender, dark hair catching in the breeze, wrapped in a white
cotton shift dress, Emma stood out against Arrendale’s red clay and
gravel.
“Finally!” Her sister opened her arms to give Allie an awkward
embrace. Emma’s dark hair, pulled back with her sunglasses, shone in
the sun. Her skin smelled of coconut. “Let’s get out of here,” Emma
whispered, pulling back with a lopsided smile. “This place gives me the
creeps.”
Allie nodded her agreement. After ten years of following orders,
standing at attention, and being counted, the pure silence of the open
road sounded like a chorus of angels from heaven. There were no
overhead announcements, no inmate complaints, and no scrape of shoes
along cement. Just wheels on asphalt, the steady whoosh of air from
bumper to taillight, and the heat through the window warming her arm
and hand.
Allie glanced over at her sister. Emma had been the constant, her
only regular visitor. Morgan Hicks, her best friend, had vanished along
with everyone else the moment the police announced the arrest. Every
month, Emma drove from Brunswick, just east of St. Simons Island, on
Highway 95 to Savannah, then made the remaining trek to Alto. No
matter how stilted or strange the visit, Allie was grateful that her sister
68
made the effort. It was no day-trip, either. The twelve-hour round trip
took planning, not to mention the cost of an overnight stay.
At first, Allie’s parents, Lily and Paul, came on holidays and
brought Caroline, who seemed to sprout an inch every few months. The
visits, short and uncomfortable, became unpredictable as her daughter
developed an uncontrollable phobia to prisons and chain-link fencing.
Her daughter broke out in hives; the skin on her neck and face blotchy
and red. According to her mother, Caroline would complain of stomach
pain—piercing, stabbing agony—in the hours before a scheduled drive.
Her aversion didn’t surprise anyone. The prison, even on visitation
days, was a loud and frightening place. The population, restless and
violent, often swelled to collective anger, especially in the summer’s heat.
Lockdowns were frequent. Shouts reverberated through the walls. Days
were filled with the clank of metal on metal, locks clicking into place, the
grind of mechanized gates.
When they drove by the turnoff to Commerce, Allie exhaled and
turned, tucking her meager belongings behind the seat. The wheels hit a
bump in the road and rumbled over deep ruts. The plastic crinkled, then
settled into place.
Allie glanced down at her sister’s purse, wedged between them. The
leather satchel, packed full, held Emma’s cell phone, a pink address
book, gum, and a few pens. An empty Starbucks mug sat in the cup
holder, her cell phone on the other side.
69
A long time ago, Allie enjoyed the same indulgences. But for a
decade, she had existed without any of it. Maybe, in some ways, she was
better off, with all the time in the world to think. She laid her head back
and let her gaze drift, absorbing the passing fields, rolling green and gold
hills, and towering pines.
It was 32 miles outside the barbed-wire gates of Arrendale State
Prison, in Jackson County, when Allie finally spoke.
“Where’s the Chevelle?” Allie asked suddenly, thinking back to her
sister’s first car; a sleek throwback to the seventies. She ran a hand
along the seat. “I miss it.”
“Junkyard,” Emma laughed at the comment, pursing her lips into
a wry bow.
“Too bad.” She fiddled with the edge of her shirt. Her own daughter
was old enough for a learner’s permit. She’d be driving soon, if she
wasn’t already. “How’s Caroline?” Allie asked, desperate to know. Was
she anxious? Excited? Nervous?
“She’s doing fine,” Emma said, her voice even. “Everything’s good.”
But she didn’t look across the seat at Allie, and her hands tensed on the
wheel. “I think Mom and Dad are going to try and bring her by.”
Try. It wasn’t what Allie wanted to hear, but she had learned to be
patient. After ten years inside Arrendale, anticipation, which used to be
excruciating, was now a dull ache. She could wait a little longer for
Caroline.
70
After a few minutes, Emma changed the subject, offering details
about Caroline’s school, a guy named Jake she’d had a crush on this
year, the clubs she joined. Emma kept talking, filling the space above, in,
around, and below, the invisible question hovering in the car between the
two of them.
How was Caroline? Really? But Allie let her sister talk. She’d
waited forever already. They’d be home soon and she would find out for
herself.
As with all family matters, Allie knew the truth was complicated—
more intricate than a spider’s web and just as sticky.
________________________________________________________________________
Laura McNeill author, Center of Gravity, a domestic suspense novel, adores hot
coffee, good manners, pink color, reading novels past midnight; believes in beauty of
words, paying it forward, that nerds rule; is fan of balmy summer nights, fireflies, and
pristine mountain lakes; lives in Alabama with her two sons. Tweets @Lauramcneillbks
and bloggs at lauramcneill.com.
~~~~~
71
Flash Fiction
Carol Robbins
“Don’t you remember carrying a shack-up kit?” I picked my jaw up
from the floor and turned to the younger woman as she continued, “All of
us in my sorority had shack-up kits that we carried in our purses if we
were going out and there was the possibility of a sleep-over, or ‘you
know.’ A compact and lipstick were in our purses all the time, but the kit
had a toothbrush, toothpaste, small hairbrush, and a pair of clean
panties.” Before I could ask, she added, “Some girls carried condoms too,
but the guys usually had them, so I didn’t. Besides, if I forgot to take the
kit out of my purse before I went home and my mother found it, the
panties could always be explained, that sometimes during that time of
the month, as she called it, I might need them. But it would have been
hard to explain a condom; most of us were on the pill anyway.”
Thankfully, someone else changed the topic of conversation before
I told her about my college experiences back in the dark ages. She would
have been astonished to find out that there were no sororities or
fraternities at my college. Study hours on weeknights and curfews on
72
weekends were strictly enforced. Dorms were not coed, and no males
were allowed anywhere near our rooms. The possibilities for sleep-overs,
as she called them, were somewhere between slim and none. I’m not
naïve enough to think that all my classmates were still virgins at
graduation, but certainly no one openly admitted ‘doing the dirty deed’ as
it was euphemistically labeled. The word ‘sex’ was not uttered by our
lips.
However, her comment has made me think, especially since I read
an article recently that said the rate of sexually transmitted diseases—
STDs, for those who don’t want to say the words—among senior citizens
is on the rise. There are lots of us in the over fifty-five category, which
those heartless fact-gathers now label as senior citizens. Through divorce
or death of a spouse many in that age bracket are also single, but
apparently not all are alone. So perhaps there might be a market for a
geriatric shack-up kit. A horrible name, I admit, but I haven’t come up
with a clever one yet.
What might the kit contain? A toothbrush and toothpaste, but
should it also contain Polident and Poligrip? Clean panties and perhaps
Depends? A packet of Metamucil? Upon request perhaps the pharmacy
could provide to-go packs: single-dose blister packs of medications for
high blood pressure, cholesterol, arthritis, diabetes, and other medical
problems. Then there is the matter of STDs. So a pamphlet warning of
the dangers, condoms, and a plastic sleeve for the doctor’s report
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showing that one has been tested and is free from diseases should be
mandatory.
How do you explain the kit to your middle-aged or older children if
they find it in your purse? Smile, then reply “Optimism, honey. Just
optimism.”
________________________________________________________________________
Carol Robbins writes from her home in Montgomery, Alabama. Like others in her
family, she feels that any personal story is worthy of embellishment. The memoir for her
mother, V. B. R.: My Mother's Story, was published in 2014. Follow Carol's blog,
Scribblings at www.carolrobbins.blogspot.com.
~~~~~
74
Juvenile Fiction
Jane Sasser
The day that Inez Johnson walked into my life, she was carrying
the biggest black pocketbook that I had ever seen. It could have
swallowed any purse my Aunt Lou carried and still it would have been
skinny, like the cows in the dream that Pharaoh had and Joseph had to
interpret. Right away I was dying to know just what was in that
pocketbook, but I was a little afraid of Inez, except for when I was a lot
afraid of her, and so there was no way I could ever ask her about it. So I
just watched Inez and tried to imagine what she would carry around in
her pocketbook, and I really had no idea at all. My mama had been sick
for a while before she died and she had stopped carrying a pocketbook, I
don’t know why. So now I couldn’t imagine what actually any woman
would carry in a pocketbook, but especially a big black woman like Inez,
a woman who could give me one look and I would get the shivers.
Every morning when she came to our house, Inez had that big
black pocketbook hanging on her arm. She would walk into the den and
plop it on the back of our sofa next to the wall, and that is where it would
stay all day long. Several times a day I would sidle past it and wonder if I
could sneak and look inside. My heart would beat real fast, and then I
would hear her mumbling to herself in the kitchen or stomping up the
75
stairs from the basement, and I would ease away from the sofa, trying to
look like I wasn’t thinking anything at all. Then in the afternoon her ride
would come, and she would slide that pocketbook onto her arm and walk
out the front door and out of my life until the next morning.
Except that Inez was never that far out of my life. In the beginning,
I wasn’t sure whether she liked me or not. She didn’t smile very much. If
I set the table wrong, or forgot to brush my teeth in the morning, she
jumped right on me. Still, sometimes in the afternoons, when she was
finished washing the dishes and we didn’t have to go out to work in the
garden or fold clothes or any of the other thousand things we always had
to be doing, she would let me sit beside her on the sofa, and she would
tell me stories.
That’s the way things went for the first year Inez came to my
house. I would pass by the sofa, look at the pocketbook, and imagine
there might be secret things inside it that little white girls could not
understand, and just thinking that made me swear to myself that I
would, too, understand. Finally I could see no way out of this but that I
was going to have to look in Inez’s pocketbook, and the only question was
how I was going to manage to do that when she was right there all the
time. And then I realized that I could look when she went to the
bathroom, if I was really fast. So when she went to the bathroom that
morning I ran to the sofa, snatched her pocketbook, popped open the
clasps, and looked inside.
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Here is what I saw: an extra pair of those stockings she wore all
the time, a hairnet in a little paper package, and a lipstick in a tube that
I rolled out and it was dark red. I sat there holding that tube of lipstick
and wondering when Inez ever wore it, because she sure didn’t wear it to
our house, and then before I knew what was happening, I wanted that
red lipstick almost as much as I wanted my mama, and I stuffed it into
my pocket. I closed Inez’s purse and put it back in its place.
It didn’t hit me until that night, when I stood in front of the
bathroom mirror wishing away my freckles for the millionth time,
unrolling the lipstick and holding it to my lips, what I had done. Inez
would see that it was missing. Would she know I had taken it? Or would
she think she had just lost it somewhere? How could I have been so
reckless? I couldn’t put it back, or she would know for sure. And I
couldn’t use the lipstick, because as I looked at myself in that mirror, I
could see that I didn’t know the first thing about how to wear makeup,
and I wiped and wiped at my mouth with the bargain brand toilet paper
that Daddy always bought instead of the Charmin, until my lips were raw
and I couldn’t tell whether they were red because they were sore or
because they were still stained with the lipstick, and I flushed the paper
down the toilet so Daddy wouldn’t see what I had done.
What would I do with the lipstick? I could sneak down into the
pasture one afternoon and throw it into the creek, but that would be
throwing away something that belonged to Inez and she had paid good
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money for, and that would just make everything worse. I put it
underneath the panties in my underwear drawer, but during the night I
got to thinking about how Inez might put my folded panties in there and
find it. I lay awake and thought about hiding it under the bed, but Inez
would run the vacuum cleaner under there and it would make a big
clunk and then she would open the bag to see what she had picked up,
and then I would be in a heap of trouble.
For days I carried it in my pocket. I had to wear pants every day so
I would have a pocket to stick it in. At night I kept it under my pillow.
When I rolled it out, I saw that it had begun to melt and had a funny
shape now.
I had ruined it. I had ruined everything. If my mama was still alive,
she would be ashamed of the kind of little girl she had had.
I shoved the lipstick to the back of my pencil drawer and piled old
crayons of top of it. I figured that was the last place Inez would look, but
really, I was hoping that I would never see it again, either.
________________________________________________________________________
Jane Sasser’s poetry has appeared in The Sun, The Atlanta Review, The North
American Review, Appalachian Heritage, and other anthologies and publications. She has
published two poetry chapbooks, Recollecting the Snow and Itinerant. She lives in Oak
Ridge, TN, with her husband, George, and rescue greyhounds.
~~~~~
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Creative nonfiction
Richard Key
News Item reported on January 17, 2015 on the evening edition of
WTVA news, Tupelo, Mississippi: A man shopping at Lowe’s in Corinth
was bitten on the face by a chicken snake when he opened a cabinet
drawer.
That was it. No details were forthcoming. If you wanted more about
this story, you might think there would be a full account in the next
morning’s newspaper. I happened to be visiting my folks in Corinth. They
watch the evening news religiously, which means they sometimes fall
asleep while it’s on. The above story was near the top of the television
news program, and well it should be. Bitten. By a chicken snake. On the
face.
Still, I wanted more, and for that I put my misguided faith in the
Daily Corinthian, a publication that has let me down repeatedly. I grew
up in that Civil War town near the Tennessee border, and have visited
many times since I left. One of the first things I do when I visit is read the
recent papers in the unlikely event that someone I know is being
recognized for some meritorious deed or being prepared for incarceration.
I never was a speed-reader, preferring to take my time and let things
soak in. But a couple of minutes into perusing the Corinthian, I’m always
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asking, “Is there another section somewhere? Is this everything? Did I
miss something?”
There was nothing about this story on page one, page two, or even
on the back page with the car ads. In journalism circles this is known as
“dropping the ball.” How do you not cover this story? Man bitten at
Lowe’s. By a chicken snake. On the face.
There’s a chance the editor was sitting on the story to get all the
facts straight before he took it to print. But many excellent stories have
been lost waiting for all the “facts” to come rolling in. Switch out cobra
for chicken snake, and open air bazaar for Lowe’s, and this story will
play in India. It’ll play in Africa. It’ll play in Asia. Throw in a reference to
Cleopatra, and there could be the beginnings of a Broadway musical.
I currently reside in Alabama, and I believe our press would not
have let that story die. I would like to think neighbors and friends of the
victim would have been interviewed, not to mention a representative from
Home Depot who would declare solemnly that his stores are snake free. I
believe they would have ridden that pony into the sunset. The governor
might have seen fit to call out the National Guard in case there was
someone that needed to have the snot beat out of him.
Curiously, about that same time, my daughter had purchased a
box of kitty litter at a Kroger’s in Jackson. At her apartment, she heard
the rustling of something in the unopened box. And, dear reader, let me
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remind you that I would not want to scare you or disturb you unless
there was money in it, but this could have been who knows what.
If you are a cat owner, you are familiar with the sound of rustling
in the kitty litter. It’s almost like someone playing the maracas. You
could be upstairs with the TV on, and you’ll hear that distinctive sound.
“There she goes again,” you’ll think to yourself as you watch Lady Mary
shooting a barb of aristocratic vitriol towards Lady Edith.
I told her to take the box back to the store and ask for a
replacement. My daughter wanted to know what was inside. And, thus
was born the litter critter, unknown denizen of the Fresh Step. She was
curious. It’s only natural. Her mother told her to take it over to her
grandfather’s house, and have him open it in the back yard. “It could be
educational,” she said. I agreed. My wife’s father is eighty-five, and our
daughter has never seen someone go into full cardiac arrest before. “It’s
probably a roach,” speculated my wife. “It’s a scorpion,” I countered. “I’m
sure it’s a scorpion.” You have to think big when fear and revulsion are
involved.
If I had not taken the writer’s vow of absolute truth, I would have
made up something here that was heart-stopping and disgusting. But
yellow journalism is not my way. In the end, she decided to take the box
back to Kroger where they either sent it back to the warehouse or to the
manufacturer for quality improvement (ha!), or put it back on the shelf
for some other hapless cat owner to deal with.
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If you’re not in the market for kitty litter, maybe you need some
cabinets or a bathroom unit with lots of drawers on the front. They sell
them at Lowe’s. There’s probably nothing in them. Why would there be?
Most of the time there isn’t. But, when there is, there’s a story, even if
the Daily Corinthian doesn’t think so.
_______________________________________________________________________
Richard Key: The author was born in Jacksonville, Florida and grew up in
Mississippi. He and his wife live in Dothan, Alabama with their cat Kiko. His real job is
pathologist, but he writes on the side. Several of his short stories and essays have been
published in literary journals.
~~~~~
82
Flash Fiction
Jackie Romine Walburn
Blood, when it’s soaked into carpet, smells like iron and dirt.
That day in our apartment, I thought about the president who had
died the week before, shot while he rode in a convertible sitting by his
pretty wife, waving and smiling. I thought about him and wondered how
much he had bled—if it was this much.
Grown-ups had told me I’d remember that day forever—the day the
president died. And they were right, but I’ve also remembered maybe
forever the day I learned what soaked-in blood smelled like.
I knew something bad had happened, something Momma didn’t
want to talk about.
And, I knew we’d be moving, again.
My stomach was hurting, and I probably told Momma, “my tummy
ache hurts” cause that’s how I talked when I was kid.
I was sure something awful had happened, and I felt sorry for me
and for Momma.
I knew that the bad thing that happened that we never talked
about probably involved James, the step-daddy who made Momma laugh
and cry. James was rough handsome, and I wasn’t old enough then to
know how dangerous he was. But, Momma, I think she had just about
figured that out.
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I kept looking at Momma that day, up and down, to make sure it
wasn’t her blood covering the carpet at the entrance to the living room,
into the hall and into a bedroom.
I never learned whose blood it was or what had happened while
we’d been in Birmingham for a Daddy weekend. We moved to another
apartment the next day.
The day after that, I changed schools for the fourth time in three
years. By then, I was used to being the new kid. I didn’t mind. It was
kind of like getting to start over every time.
We didn’t see James for a long time, which was fine by me, and
Momma stopped using his last name.
There would be other moves, other tummy aches, other schools
and other days for Momma to laugh and cry.
But I never forgot. I never forgot the day the president died, and I
never forgot the smell of blood on carpet…
…or how quickly things can change.
________________________________________________________________________
Jackie Romine Walburn, a Birmingham native and freelance writer, has worked
as a reporter, editor and corporate communications manager. Jackie is currently seeking
an agent and publisher for her first novel, Mojo Jones and the Black Cat Bone. She writes
the blog http://jackierwalburnwrites.blogspot.com.
~~~~~
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Creative nonfiction
Faith Garbin
In the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina, my grandparents’
property was a graveyard for broken-down trucks and other failed
equipment. At four, I had discovered the perfect “sandbox.” A dump
truck, lying on its side, blocked the sun, leaving a patch of the yard
shady and free of grass. Playing in the red Carolina dirt, I stacked small
rocks, constructing caves for my plastic zoo animals.
A summer breeze stirred, blowing my auburn curls across my face.
Annoyed, I turned my head, and saw Uncle Ricky approaching. He was
also redheaded, and we looked like brother and sister, although he was
much older.
He sprawled on the ground next to me in a lazy sort of way. He
didn’t speak, and closed his eyes. I thought he was napping, and I
couldn’t understand why grownups seemed to love naps while I rebelled
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against them. Bored, I turned back to my project, momentarily lost in my
make-believe zoo, the plastic animals growling in the rock caves.
Flies hummed, and then I heard the distinct sound of a zipper
being pulled—slowly. Curious, I turned my head.
Uncle Ricky’s pants were open, and his hand was moving, partially
covering something, but what? I stared, mesmerized, as that hand moved
rhythmically, methodically. Watching intently, I soon realized what I was
seeing. But how could an elephant’s trunk peek from my uncle’s pants?
How could he possibly have an elephant in there?
He opened his eyes and watched me watching him. Reaching for
my hand, he asked, “Do you want to touch it?” I searched my mind for
information about elephants, and finding them harmless, I nodded. He
guided my hand, up and down, up and down, around the trunk. It felt
smooth and silky, like my mother’s cheek, and yet it was firm.
My uncle closed his eyes again, and I heard a growling that seemed
to emanate from his throat. Then the trunk spasmed, filling my hand
with sticky goo. Thinking the elephant had sneezed, I jerked my hand
away, disgusted.
During the next four years, Uncle Ricky found new ways to disgust
me with his “trunk.” The abuse finally ended when I moved to Virginia.
How did this early introduction to sex affect me? I feared men and
physical intimacy, and couldn’t imagine getting married or having
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children. I had panic attacks, and nightmares about losing a child. At 18,
I entered therapy, and soon realized that the child I had lost was me.
I last saw Uncle Ricky 13 years ago at my father’s funeral. He
introduced me to his “woman” as the little sister he never had. I
practiced forgiveness.
I’m 57 now, and after two marriages, two daughters, two
granddaughters, and three major depressive episodes, I’m still in
therapy.
_______________________________________________________________________
Faith Garbin lives in Ocean Springs, Mississippi. Her work has appeared or is
forthcoming in Health-Healing: Body in D[ist]ress, Imagine This!, Katrina Memories and
The Awakenings Review, among others. Her first poetry collection, How We Bury Our
Dead, is forthcoming with Negative Capability Press. She studied English at Virginia Tech.
~~~~~
87
Creative nonfiction
Carol Robbins
July, 1993
Her four younger brothers dubbed her The Queen V. For years
some thought they were calling her The Queen Bee, but later realized
that they substituted the letter “V” for Bee because her name was
Virginia. Few ever heard them call her Virginia; they called her Sister
unless they referred to her by her royal appellation.
When Virginia’s cousin and husband planned a large celebration
for their fortieth wedding anniversary, several relatives rented condos at
the beach for a week to be there for all the festivities. One day almost
everyone came to Virginia’s condo to see her, and The Queen V definitely
held court. Like loyal subjects, they clustered around her in the living
room, some seated on the floor, others on a sofa or chairs. Laughter filled
the room as she recounted family stories in the same expressive voice
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that read aloud or recited poetry to her students, her soft southern
accent lending an almost musical quality. Much to the delight of the
young children, as she gestured the diamond ring on her hand caught
the sunlight like a prism and flung little rainbows across the white wall.
As she gently agitated her glass of Coca-Cola, the ice made a musical
tinkling sound, heard only occasionally during breaks in the
conversation.
One could not help but notice the study in contrast that a greatgrandchild standing next to her evoked. The tanned bathing suit-clad
child still smelled of Coppertone and salt water, with hair sun-streaked
and wind-blown from spending the morning on the beach. The Queen V’s
very fair, soft almost transparent skin settled into soft wrinkles around
her eyes and mouth. Although casually attired, she wore carefully
selected crisp white linen pants, a navy and white stripped blouse, and
her favorite “cute shoes,” white leather flats with a colorful appliquéd
parrot. Bright red earrings contrasted with her perfectly coiffed snowwhite hair. Her carefully applied powder and rouge were understated,
lipstick a soft Windsor Rose that matched her fingernail polish. Those
near her caught a whiff of her signature fragrance, White Linen bath
powder and perfume.
With only a glance and “that look” she signaled that it was time to
serve the guests. On cue, her son and daughter rose from their chairs
and moved to the kitchen where he carved the ham and roast while she
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removed bowls of potato salad, slaw, and broccoli salad from the
refrigerator. Within minutes the bar was laden with food.
One of the twins stood, saying, “Sister, I’ll fix a plate for you.
Would you rather have ham or roast?” Although she insisted that
company be served first, all deferred to her. Soon all had filled their
plates, but no one took a bite until she bowed her head and began the
familiar grace “Bless us, O Lord, and these Thy gifts which we are about
to receive from Thy bounty….”
Conversation continued during the meal, often about the food, “No
one makes potato salad as good as yours, Sister.”
She replied, “Oh, go on. But I made Brownies Deluxe, so save room
for dessert. It wouldn’t be a trip to the beach without them.”
June, 2003
Again, Queen V was holding court, this time from the living room
of her daughter’s home, where she had lived for several years after her
health began to falter. A Sunday afternoon “come and go” was being held
in observance of her eighty-seventh birthday. An earlier party was
planned for what she called “the big one,” her eighty-fifth, but a hospital
stay shortly before put those plans on hold, as did another problem near
her eighty-sixth birthday. At her request there was no traditional
birthday cake. She adamantly insisted “And NO candles.”
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From the silver trays on the dining table, guests helped themselves
to some of her favorites: bite-size orange blossom cakes, cookies, pound
cake, cheese straws, and toasted pecans. A side table held silver pitchers
of lemonade and iced tea. Once served, friends joined her in the living
room where they chatted with her and with the other visitors. When they
wished her many happy returns she made a gesture, waving them away,
saying “Not too many now, I have absolutely no desire to live to be one
hundred. I thought eighty or eighty-five would have been good exit years,
but I missed my cue didn’t I?” She laughed, and they laughed with her.
She was seated in a small recliner that replaced one of the side
chairs in her living room. Several arrangements of flowers sent by former
students and relatives were displayed on nearby tables. When someone
commented on the flowers she replied, “Their fragrance fills the room,
doesn’t it?”
When guests told her that she looked pretty, she thanked them,
adding, “I’ll have to take your word for it. It never occurred to me that I
wouldn’t be able to see to pick out my own clothes.” Not only had her
blindness progressed to the point that she could not shop for her clothes,
she could no longer dress herself. Having to be dressed while in bed also
limited the choices for garments, usually a gown and robe. For the party
she wore a patio dress in a dark fabric with small colorful shapes
scattered across it. “Cute shoes,” flats made from various metallic
leathers, encased her feet. No longer able to go to the salon, she
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depended on her daughter to do her hair, to brush it into soft curls the
color and texture of soft white cotton. Her gold earrings were a gift from
her husband on a long ago anniversary; her only other jewelry a small
ring that replaced her diamond ring when her fingers became too thin.
Although she was almost the same weight she had been most of
her adult life, she seemed to be shrinking, getting smaller. But only her
body was frail, her presence was still large, as evidenced by her
command of the room. Her mind was still quick as she talked with her
guests, identifying each of them by their voice at almost their first word
to her. Few noticed that her eyes did not always follow them when the
conversation swirled around her. It was no secret that she was now an
invalid, but a visual reminder, the Hoyer lift, had been rolled out of sight.
Guests who had not kept up with her condition invited her to upcoming
events, unaware that she rarely left the confines of her bed and lift chair.
None realized that today was the first time she had been to the living
room in over a year, nor did they notice that for the entire party she did
not even change positions in the chair.
Throughout the afternoon guests dropped by. An informal
invitation to a few friends and the members of her Sunday school class
had been issued, but many others came—almost seventy people—more
than double the number anticipated. After everyone had gone, she said,
“I had no idea this many people would make the effort to come see me.”
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Her daughter said, “Well, it isn’t just every day that The Queen V
celebrates a birthday.”
Her girlish laughter echoed in the room as she replied, “Well, I
guess that’s true, and I have outlived that other Queen V.”
When her daughter looked puzzled, she added, “Victoria died at
only eighty-one.”
_____________________________________________________________
Carol Robbins writes from her home in Montgomery, Alabama. Like others in her
family, she feels that any personal story is worthy of embellishment. The memoir for her
mother, V. B. R.: My Mother's Story, was published in 2014. Follow Carol's blog,
Scribblings at www.carolrobbins.blogspot.com
~~~~~
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Poetry
Katherine Nelson-Born
(Inspired by Adam Zagajewski’s “To Go To Lvov”)
To get to Palmyra, take the Superdome Exit.
U-turn at the blue shotgun two houses from the corner.
Or head northeast of Damascus where
the golden colonnaded avenue beckons, where
caravan camels spit into the thicket, there
christening a salamander the color of sand
beneath palms holding up the moon, where
a withered olive tree bears witness.
Careen across the serpentine river
into the Big Easy where pedicabs hover,
gleam of wax in the wet black morning,
wisp of smoke wafting from levees.
(It was never that easy.)
Green medians laced with purple beads
invite tourists from western New York State.
Empire Exit 43 finds the “Queen of Canal Towns”
whistling Dixie beneath the Temple of Baal
over carved cypress tables scented with pine boughs.
Click. Pythia smiles through the bones,
laughter like champagne bubbles rising to the rafters.
Rooftops tip into Katrina’s waters.
Atoll palm fronds whisper benediction
over washed-up coral. If you feel lost,
the fossils point the way.
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______________________________________________________________________
Katherine Nelson-Born teaches English and American literature, and consults for
K & K Manuscript Editing in Pensacola. Her poems have appeared in Birmingham Poetry
Review, Emerald Coast Review, Excelsior ReView, GSU Review, Maple Leaf Rag and
Penumbra. Winner, University of New Orleans Ellipsis poetry award, she was twice an
Agnes Scott College Writer’s Festival finalist.
~~~~~
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2015 AWC Writing Contest
Winners List
SHORT STORY – 1500 WORDS
1. Richard Perreault
2. Carol Robbins
3. Heather Clift
Resurrection
Ecdysis
Liar
Bryson City, NC
Montgomery, AL
Spring Hill, TN
FLASH FICTION – 500 WORDS
1. Larry Wilson
2. Jackie Romine Walburn
3. Sylvia Williams Dodgen
HM. Carol Robbins
Returning
Like Iron and Dirt
The House Phone Never Rings
Shack-up Kit
Wetumpka, AL
Birmingham, AL
Orange Beach, AL
Montgomery, AL
JUVENILE FICTION – 1500 WORDS
1. Randi Lynn Mrvos
2. Jane Sasser
3. Philip L. Levin
Totally, Completely, Perfectly Me
Red Lipstick Blues
The Super Cockroach
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Lexington, KY
Oak Ridge, TN
Biloxi, MS
CREATIVE NONFICTION – 1500 WORDS
1. Richard Key
News Item
1. Robert Robeson
A Mind-Boggling Medevac Mission
3. Faith Garbin
How I Learned About Sex
HM. Linda Hudson Hoagland Night of the Fools
HM. Carol Robbins
The Queen V
Dothan, AL
Lincoln, NE
Ocean Springs, MS
North Tazewell,VA
Montgomery, AL
POETRY (up to 50 lines)
1. Susan Martinello
2. Mickey Cleverdon
3. Faith Garbin
HM. Kathleen Thompson
HM. Katherine Nelson-Born
Immigrant
Daphne Wonders
Covenant
A Haibun: Journey Home
Return to Palmyra
Gulf Shores, AL
Point Clear, AL
Ocean Springs, MS
Birmingham. AL
Pensacola, FL
FIRST CHAPTER NOVEL - 1500
1. Philip Levin
2. Laura McNeill
3. Linda Triegel
HM. Kathleen Thompson
Shattered Lives
Remain a Memory
The Bridge of Sighs
Remembering Fire
www.alalit.com
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Biloxi. MS
Mobile, AL
Albuquerque, NM
Birmingham, AL
The End