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Author on Reedsy Prompts since May, 2020
Submitted to Contest #132
“Are you there God? It’s me, Annie. I want to know if you are really real.” That’s how I start my prayer. I am four, kneeling by the side of my bed, praying for my new baby brother. At least that is the way it is in my memory. I know I am four because I am exactly four years older than Adam and he was just born. Today is the day Mommy and Daddy will bring him home from the hospital. It is winter. It is snowing. I am worried. Grandma is standing by the window with the lacy curtain pulled to the side so she can see the road. In a lo...
Submitted to Contest #125
Annie shifted her carry bag from one shoulder to the other. She felt a bead of sweat roll down her cheek. Her breath came in labored gasps. The unmoving moving walkway lay as still and silent as a dead boa constrictor. If she could move either arm, she would check her watch but what did it matter? She either made the flight or she didn't. Her eyes scanned the gate numbers. There it was -just ahead- Flight 4473 bound for Johannesburg, South Africa Boarding. Her dream trip finally coming true. A line of passengers was already shuffling f...
Submitted to Contest #115
The only light is a silver gleam at the bottom of the closet door. Otherwise, there is only blackness, deep and dark as the interior of a mountain cave. I hide in the closet because the monster is not in the closet nor is it under the bed. It is sitting on the edge of my bed humming a tuneless melody that worms it way into into my head. If I could open the door, I would see my laptop stuffed in the trashcan that sits by my desk. If I could get to the laptop, I could wire for help. That is if she has not figured out how to block all my ...
Submitted to Contest #105
I am trying to see things from my husband’s point of view. It is not easy because my eyes are filled with tears. I am grateful for the tears as they have washed away the red film of rage. This evening, after dinner, when we were sitting under the giant Live Oak in our Low Country backyard, Stan, my husband, started in again. ”It was a mistake to move here. I should never have forced you to make such a giant change in your lifestyle. You have never adjusted.” I sipped my Gin and Tonic, the favored cocktail with our new Southern neighbors. No ...
Submitted to Contest #104
The silence wraps around me like an eiderdown quilt. Alone. I am alone. The children, all six of them, are off at school. Even Timmy, whom I think of in my mind as Tiny Tim- the boy in the Scrooge story, finally off to kindergarten. Sam, my husband, is playing the country lawyer in the little southern town where he intends to eventually ease into retirement. It is a sweet town, on the edge of a river that flows into bay, then to the Atlantic Ocean. As my New York friend Lib said as I was leaving, my face tearstained, my hands clutched ...
Submitted to Contest #103
My mother is gone. I am sitting at my computer, my fingers frozen over the keyboard. I want to record this momentous event, the loss of one of the most important people in my life, but I don’t know how to do it. Where to start. Where to end. I knew it was coming, but was amazed when it actually arrived. I sat by her bedside, her withered hand in mine as her spirit slipped away. Words refuse to come. There seems to be no way to make sense of her complicated life. My father brings me a brown cardboard box. On the lid, written in Mom’s loo...
Submitted to Contest #102
When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things. I don’t remember much from my childhood. In fact, I have worked hard to forget my childhood in its entirety. Still, memories float back and stick in my conciseness like the bloodsuckers we boys pulled from the creek at the bottom of the hill. Rolling up our trousers, we would wade in up to our knees and emerge with bloodsuckers attached to our legs. We would wait until they were fat with blood, then la...
Submitted to Contest #101
Susan didn’t expect to see her brother that day. She was polishing the final draft of her novel, deep into the story, when the phone rang. “Hi Pumpkin. Guess who.” She didn’t have to guess. No one called her Pumpkin-except Bruce. She swallowed hard, feeling like her throat was closing off. “Cat got your tongue?” Bruce’s voice was honey-warm just like on it was TV and in the movies. She struggled to keep her voice smooth. “Just surprised to hear from you.” “Oh, common. Why would you be surprised to hear from you big-little brother?” It was an...
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