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Weekly Contest #355
I slid into the chair that my husband, Claus, had brought to the lobby for me for the damn monthly Co-op Board Meeting. The Board Members were still milling around some twenty minutes after our supposed seven o'clock start. Of course, I was annoyed. I’d called a car service to make it to the meeting on time, full well knowing the meeting would start late. It always did. All right, I admit I’m compulsive about time. After all I know that getting from my home to my office would take 10 minutes in the summer, when a quarter of the workforce wa...
Weekly Contest #354
I saw a beautiful blue butterfly fluttering outside my window. I laughed, then cried. So the scientists were wrong, the worst scenario was wrong. The world was still intact. I lived on the 22nd floor and my building hadn't been destroyed; the ground hadn't even shaken from the impact they had predicted with such certainty. We did not experience what the dinosaurs had undergone. I lay on my bed relieved. I looked over at my clock on the nightstand. Nothing. Blank. I made myself sit up, fumbled for my remote. No TV. Reached over to retrieve...
Weekly Contest #343
She was walking back from the post office, glad it was getting dark. She always felt safer when she thought she was invisible. Pulling her gray coat tighter she sighed. The damn assignment had taken so long to complete but now it was off to the publisher, carefully proofread, and she could turn to the next project awaiting attention, a book of maps about Italy's famous regions meant to guide visitors. It was much more to her liking, opening up places to dream about visiting. She grimaced, knowing she would never really go there. An airplane...
Weekly Contest #266
Samantha knew that the only way she’d ever produce an interesting article about the city for the editor of the newspaper she’d finally gotten an interview with was to force herself to concentrate. To avoid any and all distractions, to keep herself behind her desk for as long as it took to find the strong premise for such an article. She had been desperate. Not only for the money, but for a start on the career she wanted. After all, that was why she’d enrolled in all those journalism classes after her divorce. The alimony she received just d...
Weekly Contest #265
They were so angry with me, I knew no one would agree to take me to the MacDonald’s where the Greyhound bus stopped, and I had too much with me for that long walk. So, I waited until everyone was asleep, stole out of the house to the barn, where I’d stashed my suitcases and large garment bag the night before. Getting them down from the loft was harder than getting them up there, but I finally did it. After catching my breath, I wrestled them into the old cart we used to take the kids to the pumpkin field at Halloween and harnessed the donke...
Weekly Contest #259
This story contains mentions of mental illness, suicide. and homosexuality. Walter sat slumped in his seat, not very aware of anyone. He kept thinking about his uncle, his uncle who he was named for. The uncle he'd told twenty years ago that he would never again have any contact with him. He smiled as the picture of his uncle's supposed sorrow as he'd told him that he'd never again acknowledge him came to mind. Clearly, he either didn't understand why or did and chose to ignore the validity of his nephew's decision. Why then, he asked him...
Weekly Contest #258
I was awfully busy at the office and had hoped to go in for a few hours on Saturday, but one of my brothers called and asked me to check on Mom. "Emma, I had a long talk with Mom today, and I really think something is wrong. Can you drop in on her and see if I'm right?" Oh God Jim, first, are you overreacting. You do you know. Second, I'm planning to get caught up on a few projects this weekend and it means going into the office. Third, taking car service from Manhattan to Staten Island and back is big bucks. Remember, I don't drive. And wi...
Weekly Contest #257
Lil, I don't know what to do. I want..." "Brenda, I know--a baby. You keep saying that. Why don't you simply go to a sperm bank? We've been having this conversation for more than a year now, and I don't have any other answer, since you don't want to adopt either." "I'm about ready to do anything to find a husband, but the men I meet. Ugh. Maybe, I'll just have to compromise." "Well, your mom is always eager to set you up on blind dates, or has she given up?" "No. But you know what her friends' sons are like..." "Oh I do Brenda, I don't ...
Weekly Contest #256
Sometimes when curled up with a box of Crackerjacks in front of the TV watching my Mets, memories come flooding back. I'll never forget my excitement as my father and I got off the train at a stop that was unfamiliar to me. Then a sign—Ebbets Field. Dad’s happy voice saying, “We’re almost there Brenda. Your first ballgame. And what a special night.” I knew it was special because Mom had been upset for some reason, trying to get Dad to leave me home, but he’d refused, saying, “Ida, we’ll be fine.” “Why don’t you want me to go, Mommy? You ...
Weekly Contest #255
I'd always prided myself on my ability to remain calm, to assess situations, to look for solutions instead of letting things get to me. I can’t remember the last time I cried in public, the last time I raised my voice in response to an event or the words uttered by someone I classified as a fool. When my ex-husband said I was “robotic,” and it was driving him crazy, I was sad but accepting. And so, after five years of what I thought was a nice marriage, we divorced when he said it was either couples counseling or giving up. I thought about ...
Weekly Contest #254
Emmaline still could not believe she was in London for The Season. She’d known since she turned sixteen that it wouldn’t happen. Her father’s gambling had left them almost penniless. They’d sold what few things were left--her beloved piano, a few paintings her mother had brought with her upon her marriage, and some pieces of silver that her mother had hidden when her father started selling whatever he could find to gather funds for his gambling. The only things that gave their family any relief was that they’d managed to keep that he’d hung...
Weekly Contest #253
I realized the time and jumped up from my chair next to Mom’s bed in the nursing home, almost knocking it over, and said, “My God, look at the time. I’m going to be late.” Then I slipped on my coat, and turned back to place a quick kiss on my mother’s forehead before running out the door. I heard my mother’s quiet, “Of course, Emily, running late…” as her eyes closed. Reaching the airport just on time for the 10:30 shuttle to DC, I grabbed the first empty seat and smiled at the stewardess, who smiled back saying, “You really cut it close. I...
Weekly Contest #252
After two years of enjoyment, the closing of my town’s little library brought me misery. Not only did I lose the lovely early evening walk down the lane to the town square, with its cozy library on the busy little street on the east side, and the Coffee Pot Café next to it, but I lost the weekly Tuesday meeting with people I felt comfortable with. The five members of the club had welcomed me when I moved back to the small Midwestern town I’d grown up in to live in my parents’ old home, left to me after the awful car crash that took them and...
Weekly Contest #251
While meandering through her favorite secondhand bookstore, she suddenly felt a chill. It stopped her in her tracks. Looking around she spotted a woman leaning against some shelves, staring at her. The woman was old, with wrinkled leathery skin. Her eyes were a cloudy faded blue, and her clothes, equally faded, were a strange shade somewhere between rust and black. She averted her eyes, but the woman mumbled something, and she turned back to see her holding out her trembling hand, clearly beckoning her. She hesitated but felt her legs star...
Weekly Contest #250
She hated these events, but her parents insisted that she attend. At sixteen, plump and uncomfortable in the fancy, hideous dress her mother had bought her, she was miserable. It was pink, ruffled, sleeveless and belted at the waist with bow at the back--a true horror for someone built like her—so she went around the large ballroom looking for a place to hide. She saw a large floral arrangement and walked over to it. It wasn't tall enough, but she saw a chair against the wall a few feet away, and slowly pulled it behind the arrangement. Sli...
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