Leave it to an orange to bring me to a full stop.
Confession: My instinct is 95% bullshit.
So, I have an orange tree in my backyard. It’s been there for years and years. It is not tended properly, I think there are still oranges on it from 2 years ago. Pretty much, we let it grow for itself, trim off what sticks out as obviously unhealthy, and keep it well watered.
Where Keri crosses more than keys, and willfully chooses to turn left. 3 stanzas with 154 words.
Song lyrics to “Juju Mama”. 255 words to set the player straight.
“Oh, Fenrir’s teeth!” She banged the top of the desk in dismay. “Fuck being nice about it. FUCK!” She looked around the now destroyed room. “where in the Nine Worlds have that pendulum gone off to, this time?” She threw a pillow across the room in frustration.
As she slowly put the reading room back together, she tried to remember the last place she saw the pendulum. She remembered pulling open the desk drawer and finding the tarot decks were piled in an unruly mess. She remembered emptying the drawer to properly arrange the contents and finding the oft misplaced pendulum. But by the time the drawer was in an orderly affair, the pendulum had gone missing. Again.
3,793 words
He had snuck out of the cabin early. His father was on one of his multi-day ranting sprees again and it was just too much. The was supposed to be a vacation. He was supposed to be relaxing and not dealing with the stress of other people.
He sat on a fallen log, overlooking the river’s edge. There was no other sound but the water telling secrets to itself and squirrels spreading the gossip of a human appearing at the river.
1,487 words.
After a few weeks, he was seen watching me come and go. Then one day, he was there at the bench before me. Just sitting there. I did ask if I may accompany him before sitting down. He just nodded. He seemed nervous. Like there was something he was supposed to do, but didn’t want to follow through.
After a few minutes, I blatantly asked him, “So, your boy told you to rob me, eh?” He was so surprised he tried to jump to his feet. Instead, all he could manage was falling off the bench. “No! NO! Just… um… um…”
7,422 words.
Pair of professional cleaners at my house, helping me deal with something Dter had done in her room. It was an accident, but beyond my skill set to properly clean up. The reaction had drenched her bedspread, dresser, wall, and floor. I was able to quickly clean the mess from all but the floor, where it had soaked in. I could not allow it to remain, as it would continue reacting.
1,684 words. Some nudity.
“Come on!” He is running too far ahead of me to reach. “Hurry up before they close it off! It’s so cool!” The boy was weaving through a parking lot. We pass a sign that reads “HARD HATS REQUIRED PAST THIS POINT”. He runs past a Rent-A-Cop that yelled after him. As I ran past the uniformed man, I muttered an apology and promised I would try and get the boy out of the construction site.
580 words
Yea, so, earlier today I went away again. Two weeks of nonstop stress + fever? I’m surprised it didn’t happen sooner. So I went round the way and came back with the most disjointed series of images. What follows are the scenes I could remember clearly on waking.
713 words.
The rough driving wakes me up. Sometimes I think my father intentionally aims for every pothole, dip, and raised bump when he’s driving. He calls it showing off his luxury car’s smooth suspension. The only thing suspended here is his disbelief. Another bump. “See! I didn’t even feel that! If I hadn’t been looking for it, I’d never have known it was there.”
My mother glares at him from the front passenger seat. She begins a well memorized tirade against him, his car, and his refusal to accept things are not as perfect as he wishes them to be. The two snipe at each other in the usual way that reminds me why I think marriage is overrated.
4,074 words.