April, 2016 Archives
Apr
Walter
by thegooddoctor in 100 Words
Walter was one of those fellows that if you saw him putting a nickel into a beggar’s cup you knew it was just a blind for taking out a dime or quarter. So when he offered to take care of everything for me and another friend we didn’t have to be clairvoyant to know that he was scheming.
Walter was living proof that friendship between two people depended upon the patience of one. Some friends aren’t really friends at all, just a good actor. Even with all his faults, the most difficult thing I ever said to him was goodbye.
From Guest Contributor James Freeze
Apr
The Promise
by thegooddoctor in 100 Words
They were seated in the sitting room of the small hospice apartment. The cloying odor of disinfectant hung in the air. Fading twilight filled the space. Somewhere in the hall a pneumatic door opened and then whispered closed. An outside chill passed into and through the room.
“Look at me,” she said. “You promised me eternal life. Now just look at me.” She ran her withered fingers through what was left of her wisping gray hair. She could feel strands breaking loose.
“I am looking at you,” he whispered. “I promised you eternal life. I didn’t promise you eternal youth.”
From Guest Contributor Reynold Junker
Apr
Missing
by thegooddoctor in 100 Words
He felt he’d been travelling. Couldn’t be sure. His memory was as misty as the panorama. It looked like Kiev: all those domed churches. How would I know that? The question hung there, unspoken. The answer ignored it.
He looked down at shapely legs and high-heels. What the–
The world spun. Elise was a woman: always had been. The last thing she remembered was the headache at Lloyds. Oh God…work. Did I walk out?
She reached into her handbag. Passport, cash, credit cards…no tickets.
She determined to make a doctor’s appointment the minute she got home.
From Guest Contributor Perry McDaid
Apr
Forgetting Redwoods
by thegooddoctor in 100 Words
There are trees on the west coast you can drive through. Ancient monoliths built by thousands of years’ work: rain, floods, winters, dry lightning fires. Our grandfathers’ fathers’, storytellers gone silent over the ages, tales forgotten, archaic aching fallen into disuse, a dead language. Even the wind cannot communicate with these trees anymore.
Wander beneath their canopy, sniffing soft bark with noses pressed to red fur, hoping to draw life form the redness; to taste green needles under tongue, run thick sap through veins. But they are sealed.
And all I smell is the distant salt water licking wet sand.
From Guest Contributor Jon Alston
Jon has an MA in Creative Writing. Good for him. He writes things from time to time, and sometimes people publish them. Good for him. On occasion, he will photograph things (or people), and maybe write about them; sometimes there is money exchanged for his services. Good for him. He is married and has two children of both genders. Way to reproduce. He is the Executive Editor and founder of From Sac, a literary journal for Northern California. How about that? Currently he teaches English at Brigham Young University, Idaho among the frozen potato fields and Mormons. Good for you, Jon.
Websites: www.fromsac.com www.jaawritter.blogspot.com
Apr
Hospital Song
by thegooddoctor in 100 Words
They need to run more tests but Dad pleads, “I want to go home.” This man who built houses can’t stand by himself to pee.
I sit two hours with him daily, passing my sisters or brother in the hall on either end of the visit. We touch hands, squeeze.
A curled little old man under layers of cabinet-warmed blankets, he’s shaking, all ice-blue eyes and Viking-white beard under sunken cheeks.
Television is election chaos. No help there. I realize what’s on my iPad, close his door, crank its volume: Dad and Bob Dylan, gravel-throated friends, a hospital bed duet.
From Guest Contributor Tjorven
Apr
Imperfect
by thegooddoctor in 100 Words
Some say handwriting is an art form. Practice makes perfect, the preschool teacher said. If it were true, I would have the handwriting of an exquisite 14-point Arial. Instead, my wastebasket overflows with paper balls of failure. Black smudges across my skin like dried blood from the words I’ve killed with imperfection. Sweat seeps over pores as I seethe at my incompetence. When the flawless blue lines of loose leaf repulse me, I succumb to technology. Every keystroke delivers proportional consistency, yielding blissful pride as my fingers connect. Only then am I free from the curse of my obsessive mind.
Laura Widener
Laura is a wife, mother, and coffee addict living in rural Georgia. She holds degrees in Sociology and Human Services, and completed her MFA in Writing at Lindenwood University. Her forthcoming work will be found in Riding Light and NoiseMedium, and her previous work can be found in TWJ Magazine, Morpheus Tales, and Life in 10 Minutes. Visit her blog at: http://incessantpen.wordpress.com
Apr
Speak Now
by thegooddoctor in 100 Words
Matt got the news in time to break up the wedding. Did people actually do that, he wondered, or did that only happen in the movies? Speak now or forever hold your peace. Matt couldn’t remember ever having heard that line spoken at any of the many weddings he’d been to.
Against his heart’s desires, Matt decided to sit the wedding out. Who was he to stand in the way of Carla’s happiness? Instead of attending, he returned to the site of their first date and sat quietly as a piece of the world moved on with his silent assent.
From Guest Contributor Dan Slaten