Earl slumped up the porch steps and into the kitchen where his wife was putting the dishes into the cupboards. He put the sack down and bent to take off his shoes.
"Back already?" she asked, still wielding the glare. "Is everything alright?"
"Everything is fine, honey. Just fine. I'm tired. I think I'll head to bed," he said and made his way towards the liquor cabinet.
Defection
By Linda Wastila https://linda-leftbrainwrite.blogspot.com
Life feels tiny 35,000 feet over the Atlantic. Unencumbered for the first time in a decade, I travel to Italy for an international mental health summit. Once there, I will check into the Grand Hotel et du Milan where, after two days of silk suits, pumps and polite shop talk, I will pack two smaller bags of necessary items-laptop, notebooks, a small photo album, jewelry, and bank account information-and board the Cisalpino. The train will carry me over viaducts spanning ravines and through tunnels forging ages-old granite to Geneva.
I left husband and daughter well prepared for my departure: lasagna in the freezer, lunch money taped into envelopes, clothes laid out for the school week. The month's bills slid into stamped envelopes.
Ellie was disconsolate.
"It's only a trip," I told her. "Just like Mommy's other business meetings." But there was something about journeying over the wide swath of sea, which her five-year self could not fathom. Her apprehension was instinctive and prescient, reminding me of deer crashing through our brambled forest before a storm's onslaught.
Yesterday we sat at the kitchen table with pink construction paper, purple markers, and smiley-face stickers. Chubby fingers gripping the felt-tip, Ellie drew the shaky outline of a calendar. Today is Saturday. Every night before bed she will dutifully plop a sticker into the correct square. I return home in six smiley faces.
Jonathan was more sanguine. Although terrified of being the lone parent, expressing fears of spiking fevers, refusals to eat dinner, and night terrors, he appeared relieved at the prospect of my absence. I wondered when he would squeeze Sandy into his busy schedule- while Ellie was in kindergarten? Would he spare time away from his precious lab? Would he desecrate our bed? I kept these worries to myself.
"You'll get used to the routine," I said, interrupting his morbid line of 'what ifs'. "And don't forget the spring concert Wednesday night. At six. Ellie will wear her flower dress, white tights, and pink Barbie shoes."
The man beside me snores a comforting background melody, today's La Republica folded over an ample stomach swelling with exhalations. Black curlicues wedge through his shirt collar. The chest hair, the noisy sleeping sounds provide familiar comfort-I might get some sleep on this cramped plane. To make sure, I contemplate the amber liquid swirling in the plastic cup before bolting it back. The liquor sears my throat before fading to tolerable warmth. As a rule, I don't drink Scotch, but this is my second and rules are made to be broken. On top of two glasses of Amarone quaffed with dinner, I feel nicely anesthetized.
The attendant approaches. I raise my index finger, point to the empty cup. The leather seat envelopes me. Outside, the plane's lights reflect on the murky dark of the ocean.
There is something about turning 49 that makes everything loom as question marks: the future, the past. Lost loves, decisions made. Regrets, of course. Always regrets. A younger friend, an astrologist in between writing memoirs and waiting tables, tells me my angst is due to the confluence of birth date and planet alignment. My more practical gynecologist blames whacked-out hormones and pushes medical miracles to build bone mass, reduce depression, and calm the constant thrumming of my heart. I refuse medications, preferring my raging libido and the way my mind has suddenly burst from its rational confines into a Technicolor-infused existence of words, meaning, and sensation. I feel alive, the way I felt when I was Ellie's age. Still innocent, still questing. I feel ? bold.
Well, I've always been brave. My pluck is one reason for my mother's cool distance, or so asserts my shrink. I only hope I wasn't what drove her to drink. But Mother was courageous in her way-she raised me on two bar-keeping jobs and the paltry contributions of the occasional man passing through. She passed on her gallantry through genetic code and her three-point credo trumpeted so frequently she may as well have tattooed it on me at birth: you can do anything you want, you can have it all, and you don't need a prince. I've adopted these inviolable principles as my own. For they are truths, truer than taxes, than grief, than God; only death is more certain.
So tell me-why am I, esteemed professor, prolific poet, devoted mother and wife, sitting on this wide-body jet hurtling through the heavens to Geneva? I giggle at my audacity, giddy from booze, hormones, and the knowledge my thoroughly modern mother was mostly right: I can do anything and have everything-including a Prince.
And I have found him.
The next drink appears. Golden nectar filters through me, imbuing me with a grace not otherwise present. I open the Moleskine resting on my lap. A picture of Ellie drops out; she's in the garden hiding in the peonies, lips strawberry-stained, blond hair wispy in the sun. Pressure slides beneath my breastbone, just below the granular smudge highlighted on last week's CAT scan. I slide her photograph into the back flap pocket, click my Montblanc, and soothe my fears, my hopes, my depraved desires.
I close the journal, bookmark the entry with my one-way Alitalia ticket.
Dreaming Lies to Change the Truth
By kaolin fire https://www.erif.org/
She wove lies of leaves and fruit as she crawled about the tree; it had rotted and split, but her webbing held it whole. She wove eight-faceted apples that glistened like negative prisms, sucking in all heat and life. Her manifold legs danced swiftly, all angles and jabs; chitin claws embraced, for brief moments, dry and cracking branches; her bulbous body swayed slowly in counterpoint.
And as she wove, she dreamed. She dreamed of truths, dark and gruesome; dreamed of fruit she should have never sampled-that cold stone of clarity in her heart. Her love was gone, long gone into the world of men, and dead, and she had not changed so much that she did not miss him-she had pulled his rib from her body, and she dreamed of an ache in her chest where it once had lain.
Outside, abandoned, she had tried to work her way as God, in his anger and disappointment, had intended. She'd been a wife, a mother, and much more-but the knowledge in her had burned and chafed. Her knowledge of good and evil went far deeper than she could admit-even to herself, at first; and she saw its depths with awful clarity. The knowledge, like a beast, had gnawed on her bones and soul, made malleable her flesh and her very being.
So when the one she had been made for was gone and buried, her grief and passion strengthened knowledge; and she bent under its weight. And bent, she had followed its path, and made its path her own. She left the rib to rest beside him so that no other would know her to have gone; in death, she made him whole again.
Centuries passed while she called the powers of creation to remake her. Beliefs came and went, and she became other: something outside God's realm, that had not been, could not be, banned. The angels, alert only for man or woman, said nothing when she scampered in on the eight dainty legs that held her heavy body. And so she strode into the garden, Queen as anything, and surveyed the shambles.
Around the tree, she found serpent sheddings, long decayed. The adversary had stayed in the garden for a time, but he too had done God's bidding in the end, had left to test those souls damned to roam the world outside. Finding no one, then, she fell once again upon the forbidden fruit-and finding its taste and truths unpleasant, she gorged herself on them, seeking to silence the noise with cacophony. Good and Evil was only the simplest fruit it had to offer-further in the flesh, in its very proto-soul like marrow, lay the foundations of knowledge itself.
And then-all-knowing and nigh all-powerful, it came to her. She had sucked the tree of knowledge dry and had the power of knowledge itself. She wrapped her tree in silken lies, spun promise-dreams of innocence, beguiling the fet
id flies that were the souls of her progeny generations upon generations gone. And one by one, those souls crept to her bosom through the deep roots of pride and lust, no angel left in those depths to notice or care-and she made of them eight-faceted apples that glistened like negative prisms, each soul gone leaving another dreamless automaton alone in the world outside.
The tree itself fed upon those fruits, transmuting her dreams, their dreams, to substance-to truth. And when it had fed upon all the souls of man, when naught was left but empty fleshly vessels, a new fruit would appear. And she would feed on that, and either time would cease or it would run back and be undone-she did not care-such was the dream that she sang.
Fate's Heavy Hand
By Jim Bernheimer https://www.jimbernheimer.com
The woman entered the empty chapel just as the minister was speaking. His monotone voice said, "If anyone present can show just cause why they may not lawfully be married, speak now; or forever hold your peace."
Coughing, she cleared her throat and drew their attention.
"Who are you?" The groom demanded.
"Why Sir Byron," the woman said stepping into the faint light, "don't you recognize your wife?"
The pronouncement brought a startled cry from the woman standing next to the groom. "Liar!"
The woman threw back her hood causing yet another gasp. Her face was older and the raven tresses were beginning to lighten with age, but the woman was the spitting image of the bride.
"Technically, you are right. I'm not your wife yet, and if I get my way, I never will be!"
While Sir Byron and his intended gaped, the Minister and his wife both made protective signs. They stepped back and the holy man spoke, "This is witchcraft and it has no place in the house of the Lord. Be gone!"
"Aye," the woman agreed, "it is witchcraft that has brought me to the past. Holding my peace forever was becoming tiresome. But tell me, man of the cloth, if I sacrifice my immortal soul to save my immortal soul, am I truly dammed?"
She let the Minister ponder that riddle and turned her attention to the knight and the pretty maiden at his side.
"It isn't all you hoped for dear. There are those long, lonely nights in that drafty manor, as he spends months laying siege to a castle for some cause you never understand. And the children, he treats them either like a burden or servants and promises are broken without a second thought. Take a good look, Victoria. This is what your happily ever after looks like."
"Impossible," the younger woman stammered. "You can't be me!"
"Trust me, I wish I wasn't," the cloaked woman answered with a leer, resting a hand on one of the pews, while shaking a single finger from the other at the young woman, like she was correcting a schoolchild.
"My love for Victoria is true. I would do anything for her."
"Oh there was a time that I would have believed that drivel, Byron, but that ship has sailed. I was just the wife on your arm, a symbol of status. You should have just hired someone to manage your estate! But you got out of that by marrying me. Still, I'm not here for you! I'm here to talk some sense into me and stop myself from making a mistake that will lead to a dark path."
The uncertain bride-to-be stepped closer, "I don't know what to think ... "
"You deserve better than this lout. Anything would be an improvement! Don't marry him. He might look promising now, but I am proof that he will ruin you!"
Byron also stepped forward, but he was angry and grabbed the hilt of his sword in warning.
He spat, "Do not listen to this creature! It speaks lies."
"See how quick he is to anger. If you don't, you will soon, but I know how to convince you once and for all. He says he will do anything for you, so it's time you take him up on it."
Glaring, the knight hissed his answer, "There is nothing you can demand of me."
The older Victoria answered his accusing look and said, "Very well, dear Byron, renounce your title. If your bride means more to you than everything else, prove it! Aren't you here, getting married ahead of schedule, because of the rumors that war will soon be on the land? You're already putting your king ahead of her ... me. Are you to be a husband first or a knight of the realm?"
"My word is my honor! To ask me to betray it is too much, Victoria."
The young woman protested, "Byron, I'm not asking you, she is!"
Her older doppelganger laughed, "But you are. Allow this marriage to be consummated and I am the result, a bitter, angry woman, driven to witchcraft. Is this what you want for your new bride, Byron?"
The man appeared torn. He stared long at the family crest emblazoned on his tunic and reached a decision. "Perhaps it is best that we do not proceed. If this is your future, I care for you too much to see you end up like this."
"Byron! No! Wait!" The younger woman called out, but Sir Byron broke from her desperate grasp, marshaled his pride, and walked out the entrance leaving four people in his wake. A moment of stunned silence ensued before the jilted bride collapsed, sobbing her pain for the world to hear. The Minister and his wife continued to stare at the woman in the cloak.
She shrugged off their frightened gazes. "I have delivered my warning. The past is changed and soon I will be gone. Goodbye."
Turning, the woman walked out into the night. After a hundred paces, she looked back at the chapel to make certain no one was watching. The witch allowed the illusion to disappear. She was lucky. The prophecy that a child, born of their union, would cause her downfall would never be fulfilled. The knight could be eliminated easily enough in the coming war. There would be no reconciliation. Her safety was assured.
Cackling, she mounted her broom and flew into the night.
Back in the chapel, Victoria slowly regained her composure. The Minister and his wife offered what comfort they could, before vowing to never speak of the night's events.
Victoria thought about a life without Byron and how she would go on. She didn't even have a chance to tell him that she was already pregnant. Their child would be born out of wedlock and her life was ruined ? all because of witchcraft! She would never forget this and neither would her baby.
Food of the Gods
By judy b. https://onzeproductions.com/Site/Home.html
Austin knows he'll have to make up for this, storming out before the argument is over. They'll have to talk about it, which means he'll have to listen-again-hear how insensitive he is, how he belittles her work, her goals. It's true: he doesn't like to listen. He's a professor; he imparts knowledge. He likes to talk. OK, hold forth. Well, she knew that when she took up with him. She knew what he was like.
Austin has a Ph.D. in American History from one Midwestern university and he teaches at another. He met Josie his first night in town; she was waiting tables at a nice restaurant someone had told him was a good place for dinner. He'd flirted with her, thinking she was younger than he and not as wise. After a year, he's still not ready to concede the latter point.
His route to the U never varies, though his mode of transport does. He sometimes rides his bike, more often walks, but today he is piloting a 10-year-old import, because of the rain. Cold rain that in a month will be snow. He is starting his second year at the university, entering his second year of life with Josie. She moved in last month.
Their argument was over, of all things, fruit.
Austin made a remark about the persimmons Josie had in a blue bowl: "Ah, persimmons," he'd said, "food of the gods." Then he'd offered a short history lesson on how the English couldn't wait until winter to eat the bitter fruit the American Indians called "pessamin," didn't realize it ripened and sweetened in the cold. How the Native Americans shared with Hernando de Soto a kind of bread made with what the conquistador thought was prunes. Austin had picked one up, and Josie told him it wasn't ripe.
"I wasn't going to eat it."
"Of course not. You were going to pontificate on it, ruminate over it to the point that I no longer want to look at it, let alone bake a tea bread with it-which I definitely
won't want to give you a taste of, because I'd just get a lecture on the history of tea, the beverage, the meal, the ritual, the ? the ? oh, fuck it, Austin, just go to work. Go lecture the people who don't know anything yet. Talk to the people who want to listen." She threw a handful of spoons into a mixing bowl filled with water in the sink and walked away.
They've had this conversation before, about how he can't just enjoy a thing, appreciate the look, the feel, the taste of something. Why couldn't he just observe how striking the contrast of the orange persimmons in the cobalt bowl, if he had to say anything at 7:30 in the morning? He knows this is what she's thinking.
Austin understands it's particularly annoying when the topic is food, because Josie herself is a professor, of sorts, of the culinary arts. She is now the chef at that restaurant where they first met. She was not a student back then, but a graduate of the California Culinary Academy and the veteran of several different San Francisco caf?s, bistros, and one major restaurant he'd never heard of but evidently should have. She snagged him with her white apron, but she hooked him with her handmade pizza crust. She knows something better than he does, and yes, this troubles him a little, but he's big enough to know his resistance is ridiculous. He's working on it.
The other thing they argue about is his driving to work, when they live only a mile from campus. She wants him to walk or ride the bike or catch the bus. It's a waste of gas, especially considering he always stops at Brady's caf? halfway in for a coffee and a muffin, where he's standing right now. It occurs to him just then that before he remarked on the persimmons, he had smelled something in the oven. She had baked him muffins. She'd been talking about it, but usually started her mornings later than he, because she was at the restaurant so late. He hadn't even said good morning or told her how nice it was to see her awake, first thing.
The girl behind the counter says hello to him, but he turns away, plods back to the car in a daze. He considers driving home and apologizing, but running through that narrative in his mind, he realizes it's forced, contrived, implausible. Better to play out the role of the idiot male and take what's coming when she gets home at midnight. He doesn't notice the two persimmons sitting on the roof until he is unlocking the door. There is a note, written on a crumpled receipt, rain droplets gluing it to the driver's side window: