i wish you would step back from that ledge, my friend

and THIS is my cover letter.
i think it's nifty...*shrug*

"Write this down."

As a three year old, I was pushy, bossy, and full of imagination. My writing consisted of a lot of wavy lines that I was quite sure equaled writing in cursive, and when I tired of making the lines, I passed it off to the boys my mom babysat, demanding they write, while I dictated. I remember my very first story, or at least the vaguest idea of it - a thrilling tale of attacking bears, written in a pastel diary, and illustrated with the tracings of the plastic circles that held delivery pizzas together and doubled as Barbie doll tables.

But it was a start. In fourth grade, we wrote a story about what we would do if we were locked in a library overnight. I didn't have time to write the full novel of my adventures in one night, but I do still have the notebook I started the real version in. Twenty-something pages of what is now ridiculously dramatic, terribly corny and unthinkably poor start to a horror story, but at the time was literary gold. I had just seen Scream and it had simultaneously scarred me for life and inspired me. I have since given up on horror (it's not my forte), but the assignment had sparked something in me, and I spent the next seven years, writing scenes from cheesy teenage romances: the consequence of being a lonely and pudgy adolescent girl who was (and is, to be quite honest) obsessed with boys. I could pretend that I was a beautiful slender blonde girl that no one could resist.

I wrote to escape myself. I wrote to rewrite myself.

Rewriting myself never worked (thank God, because the girls I wrote about were ditzy and typical, with high heels and belly-bearing shirts), but the words did give me a brief escape: emotionally, mentally, and almost physically. It was a boredom stopper, on rainy afternoons. My best friend and I would pass two notebooks back and forth, each writing a page, and completely changing the direction the other wanted to go in. At thirteen, we wrote about things we didn't know - love, college, sex. We wrote about things we did know - unrequited love, the desperate desire to fit in. As I got older, my writing refined itself. I left off with my teen Harlequins, and picked up my pen for fantasy.

Fantasy intrigued me; you can make anything you want happen with fantasy. It was the ultimate escape, into a world where normal girls were half-elf and beautiful men were ensnared by dazzling sorceresses. I still had occasional Harlequin moments, but they were better written, less drippy. Fantasy consumed me. I started a novel. I started a trilogy. I wrote my first short story (it was terrible). I refused to show anyone. Occasionally my little brother could coax one of out of me. I'd share ideas with my boyfriend. No one could see the pictures my words turned into. I was terribly embarrassed and freakishly scared. I knew, truly, that I wasn't the worst of the worst, but still held a ridiculous fear of being told to never again touch a pen for any reason. And I would read something from someone I knew I could never write like, and shrink even further into myself.

Once I got to college, and realized writing was something I could actually pursue, my joy knew no bounds...But I still wouldn't show anyone what I wrote. Which was going to get extremely difficult in classes to come, I was quite sure.

In a class last year, I had to write a paper. We were given a lot of leeway with the paper; it had to argue something affecting a "community" we were involved in. My professor encouraged me to write about being such a closet writer. I worked through a lot of my issues in the paper, talked myself out of a lot of idiotic ideas and excuses. I still don't like to just pull out my work, wave it around my head and demand people read it, but I don't hide it, or refuse to discuss it, which is a major improvement. Sometimes I'm even relatively proud of what I write. And I've realized I don't have to write like Virginia Woolf, I just have to be good in the way that I do write.

I have started playing with different types of writing. I read a lot, to look at different styles, and to play with my own. Integrate new things that I like, take out things I do that I don't like in other writers. I have a general style, for the most part, but it's a continuously changing process still. I write from different points of view, alternating between first and third person. I still like writing fantasy (my trilogy isn't even close to finished – nothing is, really), but I try different genres. I like historical fiction a lot. Lately, I have also been trying my hand (quite literally) at a style somewhere between Meg Cabot (The Princess Diaries), Audrey Niffenigger (The Time Traveler’s Wife), Julliet Marillier (Daughter of the Forest) and Patricia C. Wrede (Dealing With Dragons).

More than anything, I used to be terrified of writing poetry. I tried. To be quite honest, I was terrible. When I got extremely emotional, I could occasional toss out incredibly distressing ones, but none that I would ever in a million years shown anyone, show-and-tell phobia or not. I started practicing, for this class. Dorothy Parker is my very favorite poetess in the whole wide world, and it kills me that I can't write like her, in any shape for or fashion. My rhyming poems sound like commercial jingles. I'm incredibly confessional in my poetry, and there seems to be no stopping it. A Sylvia Plath, without all her fabulousness and suicide attempts, although not nearly as good. I'll stick with my stories, I think. But, after this class, I'm so much more confident in my poetry. It flows, stream of conscious. It is a catharsis, and a method of journaling. I am completely content with what I accomplished in that aspect of my writing this semester. Not that poetry is the only thing: I am so much easier about my writing. Almost twenty people have seen something now, and critiqued it even, and not everything was flowers and sunshine, and I took what they said, and I will make things better. I didn't fall apart, I didn't melt, I haven't completely given up on writing because of helpful suggestions as to ways I can improve. I have grown. I have now written two short stories. I can handle poetry. I found I actually enjoy being critiqued, which isn't so surprising really, given my intense desire to have attention focused on me, no matter how embarrassed I get when it is on me. I have made an incredible breakthrough in my craft of writing, and I feel like nothing else I do will be quite as monumental to me as this class was. Quite seriously. Words do not do justice to how much I loved this class, and how excited I am to continue my writing education.

I plan on taking more classes, as many as I can fit without killing myself before I get my Writing BA. After that, I'll get my masters (or that's the plan now, anyway), and if I can't find some incredibly beautiful and rich man to support me in the lifestyle in which I plan on growing accustomed (i.e. a diet of bonbons, lots of silk dresses, a nanny to watch my countless children, and endless writing until I am finally discovered as one of the brightest new writers of my day (sounds a bit like one of those cheesy stories I mentioned writing earlier, doesn't it??)), possibly my doctorate if I'm feeling really ambitious, and then I want to be a writing professor, and help more unsure artists blossom and discover themselves textually.

how to hate women when you're supposed to be a feminist.

THESE are poems from writing class, that i actually turned in.


“social drinking in a familiar setting”

c
r
a
z
y
eldest daughter that i am
and like a complete fool
on break with my family
i sampled a tequila
sunrise and by sampled
i mean i sucked it down in
thirty seconds flat my step dad
made it for me i became belligerent
and obnoxious my brother took care
of me even though i broke his bed
twice i wreaked havoc on my
social life via the internet
ill never drink
a s
g w
a e
i a
n r
i !
at least
maybe not for
another few days


"Another Disgusting Sestina About Love (or, I'm Really Sick Of Writing Confessional Poetry and Of Mooning Over You)”

this poem is going to be the last
of all the poems i write about You
(at least...i truly hope).
a ridiculous amount of time has passed since i first clapped eyes on You. time
that would have been better spent learning the names of the body
systems (now that i'm failing

biology - i think i might be failing
at forgetting You too). how long is this going to last?
seriously. You're nobody
special. except You are. i've certainly never met anyone like You
i want so much more from You than the time
of day. and i keep convincing myself to hope.

my hope
knows no bounds. it is obnoxiously resilient and unfailing.
which is good for other life situations. do You remember (i'll never forget) the time
we sat on my floor and drank the last
of the wine? i kissed You.
and then suddenly we were on my bed, my pale body

practically bare against your lean, smooth body
and in my drunken stupor, there was a little bubble of hope
to carry over to the morning, that the man to share my alwaysbed would be You.
silly dreams from a silly girl whose supposed catharsis is still failing
(quite spectacularly) to make things better. fervently i hope that this is the last
time

i write words eulogizing our time
and You, and Your mind, and Your body.
i mean it! this is the last
one. maybe. i hope.
i don't have any self discipline though. and i'm not really afraid of failing
anymore. not at this. i've already lost the most important thing...You.

thinking about You
wastes time
and mocks my failing
heart and body.
stop, Hope!
here it is at last - -

the last
stanza of the last poem i ever write about You.
i hope.
"a pantoum conveying this writers anguish at being forced to rhyme...over and over and over"

My prose is perfectly natural;
My free verse isn't the best;
With pantoums, i grab my hair and pull:
Rhyming, I find, is a pest.

My free verse isn't the best,
I muddle through with the skills that I got,
Rhyming, I find, is a pest
I hate when I do it a lot.

I muddle through with the skills that I got.
I use alliteration from time to time
(I hate it when i do it a lot)
Mostly I just hate to rhyme.

I use alliteration from time to time,
It's a perfectly painless pastime to play,
Mostly I just hate to rhyme --
C'est beaucoup qui je prefere.

It's a perfectly painless pastime to play…
If you like that "dimes" sounds like "limes"
C'est beaucoup qui je prefere
Than make "imes" sounds multiple times.

If you like that "dimes" sounds like "limes"
Write an ode to a really cheap store.
Then make "imes" sounds multiple times,
While I smack my head on the floor.

Write an ode to a really cheap store,
(I don't prefer writing in verse)
While I smack my head on the floor.
(Rhyming makes me #*$%@!& curse).

I don't prefer writing in verse.
With pantoums, i grab my hair and pull,
Rhyming makes me #*$%@!& curse,
But my prose is perfectly natural
“the reason i no longer eat sesame seeds”

you have ruined things for me.
inanimates i can no longer speak or see.
they bring you back with a rush
and suddenly i'm sitting on the floor,
comic book clutched in my arms,
crying over the pterodactyl on the cover.
i can never wear my green beret again.
you liked it.
so yesterday --
i burned it.
along with the mask,
when we matched
on our first halloween.
the only escapee of my purge
was your raccoon,
because i
(unlike you)
am not so cruel
as to lead a dependant soul
to her aching death.



“halloween”

you wear a mask
and it is very nice
(i suppose)
it adds a certain happiness to your face
i never used to see.
it is happier--
sneakier.
it is light over dark,
color over what you always thought
was your insipid, vacant character,
when all i saw was you.
it is less pang, more pretty.
pain is beauty, my dear,
i told you that and you still don't believe me.
instead
you go about your business
and attend to your life
and you never quite look at me
ever since i told you,
in spite of all that,
i wish you'd take it off,
because the sad little face underneath
is a thousand times sweeter.



“master”

These women
Held by their [self created] chains.
How can you just leave them
There
Alone in their frames,
Rubbing their wings raw?
Is that how you see yourself,
Artist-lady?
Are you such a puppet,
Tied to a tree
To the world
To your enslaving teacups and dance floors.
Will your master jerk the
Strings and you'll find yourself
Gyrating for the court,
Oh so fragile in your strength
Oh so beautiful in your fragility?
Or am I the one
Staring out from this cage?
Demanding you release my strings
Then cowering to the floor
Defiance in every curve
Of my body.




“end of the world”

A brilliant sun shines down on
A world gone harsh and cold, as --
Almost -- cold as a farthing on
A fire warmed face, streak of salt-
And-water tears, immaculate
And sad from the snowy coin world.



“miasma”

It has been a long time
Waiting
Waiting for my metamorphosis
The wind blows clean
And fresh
Against my face.
I do not move
Eyes shut tight,
I am the immortal soul of stillness.
Expectant.
I cannot deny
I am nearly shivering with
Anticipation.
My heart would stop in my chest
[were it ever started]
I am so impatient.
But still…
Curious.
And I will wait
Chin pushed forward
Wings folded flat
For the breeze to blow the right change to my door.





“phenomenon”

i am sucked in
to the whirling center of his gravitational pull
to find myself in a mass of other stars
and dust
whipped about and mixed together
forming one giant entity of empty matter.


“i liked you until you started talking”

they were strong hands,
and good hands--
long-fingered rough hands.
they’d been reprimanded and scolded
because they didn’t play the violin
with all the grace that they should.
they had been
in the army
and they hated it;
they were made to love
and to make
not take or break.

they were gentle hands,
and they knew how to hold my hand
and they played across my stomach in the moonlight;
their calluses made me shiver,
with delight and with fright.

the nails were bitten and the palms were dry--
they had no sense of their own beauty.
they shook
and were steadied
with the passing of the pipe.
i have never seen such nervous hands,
unsure hands,
disconnected hands.
hands I wish I could keep

without the rest of you

aura of love [yes! it's actually the title!]

the beginning is another blog, but i made it a short story!!

My parents had a whirl-wind courtship. They met six weeks before my father left with a group of his buddies to go off on a Peace Corp mission to save whales in Tajikistan, and certainly didn’t waste any time. They got married four days before he left. I always thought it was pretty risky business, but no one asked me. There just is not a lot of room for changing your mind. Daddy's parents bought them a house as a wedding present. Mom's disowned her.

To listen to them talk, they were the two prettiest people on the planet. Personally, I don't think Daddy would have been my type. He had a long, dirty blonde ponytail, a hoop in each ear, and a chest and back full of tattoos. The night they met, Mom talked him out of dread-locking his beard. He talked her out of smoking, a habit she had recently picked up from her boyfriend. He drove a motorcycle and was living with seven other guys in a three bedroom, one bathroom house. Mom claims that what caught her eye first was Daddy’s rugged jaw line. Daddy says it was the fact that his nose was crooked and bloody, due to having just gotten in a bar fight over the correct amount of respect to show the lady bartender there, who happened to be his sister. Regardless, that bloody nose was a Godsend - Mom passed out at the sight of all the blood and Daddy had to walk three blocks to the hospital: carrying an unconscious girl, bleeding profusely the whole way.

Mom was tiny and pale, with a chestnut braid to her lower back, and glasses when she read. Daddy still says her brown eyes are the most beautiful he's ever seen. Now don't get me wrong, I love Mama's eyes, but I consider myself lucky to have gotten Daddy's: a deep, deep sapphire blue, with crinkly little lines at the corners brought on by a smile. Mom says I have Daddy's smile too - the kind that makes the people follow you to the end of the earth, she says. I don't know about the last part, but I’m happy with whatever results in me being like Daddy.

I think his parents (my Gram and Pop, who routinely visit our house; Pop with pockets full of peppermints and Gram perpetually smelling like lavender) were hoping Mom would make him grow up. I guess Gram and Pop were right about Mom making Daddy grow up, because he quit whatever it was he was doing overseas after three weeks to come back to her. She had the nice little house all set up for them, and eight months later, my older brothers were born – all three at once.

There are seven of us all told: the four older boys – John, Mick, Evan, and Drew, who always fit in better as the third triplet than Mick did. John, Evan and Drew were all cut from the same mold; dark haired, bright eyed, and in love with science, hunting, tiny perfect women that they have all made wives of. Mick is a different sort of man, prone to hysterics and fits of creativity. He is an artist, a painter who has made his fortune portraying nude men in acrylics. The other boys were never quite sure what to make of him, and the two of us developed a connection of monumental proportions. We were closer to each other than we ever were to the siblings we shared the womb with. Lily and I were born four minutes apart, and she lorded it over me for the entirety of our childhood. Only recently did she realize that perhaps being older isn’t quite so exciting when you are in your twenties as when you are seven. Caleb is the youngest, our small brother, who has grown into a strapping man, taller than all of his older brothers. He lives with an older woman (Mom almost had a heart attack when he told her), a massage therapist with pink hair, who has been having his children since he was nineteen. There was another, smaller sister right after Caleb, but she was born with something wrong with her heart, and as hard as Mom and Daddy tried, they couldn't fix it. We lost her within three months, I don't think any of us ever really got past that.

We were always poor. Mom taught English for four years, until she realized she was having another multiple pregnancy, so Daddy quit writing free lance, and actually got a steady job with a desk and a cubicle, writing articles about how the counterculture would take over the world and how we should all ride bikes, before anyone else ever thought about it. Mom stayed home and made sure we could spell and didn’t burn the house down. In spite of a lack of monetary funds, we were always happy and I can’t remember wanting for anything, with the exception of a deep seated longing for at least one Barbie doll with both hands still intact – I always knew it was Caleb, no matter how many times he tried to blame the dog.

Oh the dog. A huge, furry, slobbering beast of a dog that Lily and I found as a puppy. He was tucked in the corner of a dilapidated old box next to the grocery store around the corner from our house. Mom used to send the two of us, because our bikes had baskets on them, where the boys (even Mick) were too manly for baskets. We dubbed him Fringe, shoved the loaf of bread from Lily’s basket into my already overloaded basket and brought him home – fleas, mange and all – to take his place on the woven rug between our beds for the next twelve years. Possibly he slept there for the remaining years of his life after Lily and I were both gone, our matching pink paisley bedspreads replaced with flowery, embroidered numbers to create a more refined guest room than two little girls hot pink retro tastes would have. Possibly he preferred the embroidery.

After the triplets were born, Mom and Daddy realized the house his parents had given them was entirely too small. Two little bedrooms were lovely for newlyweds, not quite as lovely for a rapidly growing family. Out of the city, and into the suburbs, to a rundown, six bedroom place with a garden in back and fence of tulips and dark, wet soil that carefully recorded any footprints left over by a child sneaking out in the night. We all tried, multiple times, and were always caught. There was a period of about ten years when Daddy had to check the area every morning. They were furious with us every time. Mom finally told me after I left that she enjoyed it; it added a nice break from the monotony of well-behaving kids, she said.

How they afforded the house was never discussed, but a secret trip to the Forbidden Grandparents on Mom’s part wouldn’t have surprised me. I doubt it would have surprised Daddy either. We lived there my whole life, and Mom refused to move even after we were all grown and gone. She said we’d fill it up again. At last count, I had ten nieces and nephews. John, Evan, and Drew seem to be on a mission to see whose wife can have the most babies the fastest, and Caleb isn’t lagging far behind either. I have none of my own, desiring to be well settled and married before I even start thinking about it. Lily too has yet to have kids, she says she won’t “subject another generation to the blatant poverty from which we suffered for the entirety of our adolescent years, nor will she force a child to live alone in a house with adults.” Lily is on her way to being a divorce lawyer, and has yet to suffer a day in her life.

Daddy died four years ago, of cancer. Lung cancer, from working at a smoke infested office; he’d never touched a cigarette in his life. I have never seen my mother fall apart that way before. She has always been a tough, strong woman. Daddy took care of her, always, but she was the backbone and standing stong of our family. As deeply as I’d wanted to fall apart with her, I had done my best to hold us all together; after that many years, I think she earned the right to be a little emotional for a while. Had she not quit smoking the night they met, she would have thrown all tobacco products out immediately. I moved back in with her for a few months. We went out to lunch one day, and she actually pulled a cigarette out of a teenage boys mouth, put it out with her shoe, and told him his wife would never forgive him if she had to bury him early. I turned a delightful shade of crimson, and pushed her into the restaurant, apologizing profusely. We watched him through the window, and he dropped the entire box into a garbage can outside before he came in. Mom got better after that. I asked her once if she had forgiven Daddy yet, and she said she had, the day that boy quit smoking. His death had made a difference in at least two people’s lives, she said, and that was more than enough. I moved back at soon after that, back to my apartment in the city, a few hours away, and found myself missing my mother, in a way that I highly expect stemmed from the loss of my father. I covered my walls in pictures of my family, and our house, and made more frequent trips home.

The house itself is two stories, complete with an attic filled with crappy old furniture, and a basement that was perfect for playing “hide and go seek” and, later, for getting high when the parents were out. It has been whitewashed every five years without fail for as long as our last name has been on the mailbox out front, which was the first thing Daddy did, after he carried a very pregnant wife over the threshold, three little boys screaming from the wide open car where they were still locked into their seats. It was on her birthday, which happened to fall on the first Saturday in May, and we turned it into a sort of anniversary of the formation of our family. It is a day that has been more revered by each of us than any other holiday. Like clockwork, the first weekend in May we go home, no matter where we are. This is more important than Christmas, than Thanksgiving, than Easter. Those are skippable, excusable, allowable absences. The first weekend in May is required, or you are immediately and unceremoniously kicked out of the family. We do this as much for ourselves as for our parents, and our mother has spent the last twenty-five years worth of five year increments making lemonade and sitting in a lawn chair with her feet propped up on the porch railing telling us what we are doing, have done or possibly will do wrong in the next five minutes.

It has been five years to the day since the last whitewashing, and we have been called home once more, from where ever we are: away from our children and our spouses and our jobs. We have come home for the last time. This time, there will be no lemonade. We have come home to say good-bye to our mother, who is finally unable to wait any longer to track down our father in the afterlife, the existence of which is the only thing they ever fought over. It was agreed that it would only be the seven of us, no one else, and we would take Mom’s ashes and sprinkle them in her fence of tulips. While we are quite sure the new owners of the house would find this disgusting, we know it is exactly where our mother would want her final resting place to be. We stand solemnly in a straight line, and Caleb holds the urn. We feel like something should be said, but her funeral was yesterday, and we are now empty of words, and have only feelings and the love that was always held our family together to send out into the world with her remnants.

After this, we repaint the house for a final time, before we have to sell it. Lily is inconsolable, and keeps walking over to stroke Mom’s old lawn chair, making hiccupping noises. Mick has brought pictures of his new boyfriend with him, as if daring us to say something at this particular junction in our lives. I, as always, am the first to show Mick that he is part of our family, that he will always be part of our family, and I ask to come visit them before I leave for Africa next month to teach children how to be more sanitary. I am unsure about this endeavor of mine, although I have been planning it since I was twelve. If my father couldn’t do it, I have no reason to think that I will be able to. But I am also my mother’s daughter, and Mom was nothing if not obstinate.

Mick and I are the last ones to leave. I am standing at the end of the side walk, pondering the “for sale” sign next to the mail box. I hate the idea of this house being empty of children, but I like the idea of another little girl in my bedroom even less. I wonder if they will figure out about the soil around the tulips before or after they leave footprints. Mick puts an arm around my shoulders and squeezes me. I have not cried today. I do not want to cry. Girls who cry don’t join the Peace Corp, Daddy always used to tell me. Mick tells me he is surprised I am not moving into the house. I tell him it would be lonely, and he says that I should fill it up with kids. The stars are coming out and I still have a three hour drive back to my tiny apartment. I sigh and bite my thumb nail. Mick takes a step back and watches me, as I wrap my hands firmly around the real estate company’s sign and wrestle it out of the ground, covering my shoes in clods of mud and grass, my cheeks covered in tears. I look at Mick defensively, daring him to say something, but he just holds his hands up in gesture of surrender. I throw it into the trunk of my car, dirt and all, hug Mick good-bye, and head home, or at least back to where my stuff stays.

It has been a long day, and I stop at a little bar a block away from my house before heading the rest of the way home. I am tired, and my head aches, and while a beer is not the best thing for my physical wellbeing, it will greatly improve my mental wellbeing. I fall onto a stool, and an icy bottle magically appears in front of me, a cloud of vapor issuing from the open mouth. The bartender, Sam, knows me well; not only have I been coming to this particular bar for the past five years, but he is my cousin. He has been working the bar for my aunt since he was old enough to see over the counters.

One of the waitresses comes over and whispers something quietly in his ear, and he nods and tells her he will keep an eye on him. Men regularly get handsy with her. Her name is Lisa, and she looks like a runway model. I would get handsy with her too, if I was a man. I sit quietly and nurse my beer, and Sam checks on me from time to time. I cry a lot, but I laugh a little to, and by the time I’m half way through my second beer, I have decided to stick to my original plan, and maybe buy my home back one day. There is a squeal from Lisa, and Sam heaves a great sigh and heads over to eject his groping patron, but before he is even out from behind the counter, there is the sound of cracking wood, and the groper is on his back on the ground, a table splintered beneath him.

Standing over him, yelling about his sister’s honor and just exactly where this groper can put his hands, is a man. A tall man, with dark brown hair falling to his shoulders in nappy dreadlocks. He is completely smashed, barely coherent, and Lisa looks embarrassed. He is staying with her, and she can’t leave to take him home until her shift ends in three hours. I leave my stool, and offer my services. He has dark brown eyes. I smile, and he follows me complacently across the bar. Lisa is offering me gas money, free meals, to buy my drinks, to pay off my tab, whatever I want she’ll give it to me. She seems to think this is a burden. I refuse her, tell her I am more than happy to do this, and lead Gareth to my car. His knuckles are bleeding. I’m not sure why, seeing as how he broke the table with another human, not his fists.

He is beautiful and he keeps staring at me. Plans can change.

Maybe I won’t go to Africa after all.

go meander in the cold

You’re sad, he says simply, and I nod. He holds out his arms from where he sits in the corner of our dilapidated old couch, and I crawl into them. My knees are folded to my chest, my butt on one of his legs, my feet on the other, and he wraps his long, long arms completely around me, his spidery fingers clutching leg and arm to hold me there. I bury my face in his neck, and play with the hem of my red plaid flannel pants. Whats the matter, honey, he asks and I can’t tell him. Can’t make words come out. Can’t make thoughts form coherent sentences. I’m lost is all, I say, and he cuddles me closer until I start to cry soft, silent tears the size of baseballs, or maybe it’s just my eyes that feel like baseballs – great swollen spheres of wood and cloth that can’t see anything, and just weight like lead in my head. He kisses my forehead. I grab a fistful of his shirt in my hand and try to breath, deep slow breaths, in out in out in out iiiiiin out iiiiiiiiiin out no no no iiiin ouuuut iiiiin ouuuut iiiiiiiiiin out iiiiiin out until he forces me up cups a hand over my mouth and makes me breath right.

if we're adding to the noise turn off your stereo radio video

i forgot i had this. i wrote it long long ago. and it's excrutiatingly cheesy, even by my standards. i seem to have a thing about golden haired angel girls. which is wierd; i'm not that into blonds. not that there's anything wrong with them! my mom and sister are. just sayin, ever since the Great Hair Dying Fiasco And Chop Job in fifth through seventh grade, i've learned it's not for me.

anyway, it's really quite disgusting, but what're you gonna do. it was a year ago, i was lonely, and this seemed like an ideal situation. sort of. i guess. whatever, maybe i'm just a romance nerd.

For years he had known her, seen her everyday, but he really only talked to her anymore on Sundays, and Wednesday nights. Their parents had been friends since college, and had had their children just six months apart. She had been his best friend, and they’d even been married once, in the garden behind her house, with his dog, Bell, as the minister. They’d gone on camping trips with their fathers, and she’d been every bit as good a tree climber as he was. She helped him be the best at throwing, and catching, and kicking, but he’d never been able to outrun her. One night, he’d run away from home – right into her tree house, and she brought him blankets, and food, and spent the night with him. But that was all years ago.

They were so different now – he’d started sports, had friends that were boys instead of just her. Now he was popular, had an image, had girlfriends, drank on the weekends, got pulled over for speeding, spent a night in jail, and went to detention regularly for a myriad reasons. She had always been quiet, and became even more so. She painted, and acted, and wrote poetry, and danced – not dancing like the girls he went with, but ballet, and her slender, graceful body was well suited to it – and always she read.

And so their friendship wavered, and they began to fall apart. From long conversations and weekends together, to a quick hi while passing, and an hour here and there after school, to averted glances and only seeing each other at church, and at their families’ Sunday dinners. He still told her everything when he saw her – they weren’t that far gone – things he was proud of, things he knew he shouldn’t have done, but what would his buddies have said if he hadn’t?, girls that had hurt him, and girls that he had hurt. And she just listened, always meeting his eyes with that serene stare of hers, eyes that cared, but never judged, and wondered, but didn’t question. He’d never met someone whose thoughts he could read in a glance. And she understood – he knew she did – everything he said, and did, and why he wouldn’t – couldn’t – talk to her at school, or hang out in the old tree house, and why he started letting her go alone with their fathers on their annual camping trip.

His parents had never had to force him to go to church, because he always knew she’d be there, and deep down, he couldn’t bare to lose her entirely. And she’d sit next to him, and he’d write her notes on the program, and whisper until she shushed him, and She’d stare resolutely at the minister, despite his best attempts to make her laugh. He’d gone to every play she’d ever been in, cheered the loudest and brought her flowers every time, but he never told his friends – they couldn’t know about that part of his life.

She’d grown into a beautiful woman, just barely reached his shoulder, petite, and solemn, but always with a smile for anyone. She never drew attention to herself, but was always noticed. Her hair was straight and thick, and hung far down her back, when she let it, but she usually kept it in a fat, golden bun. She had the biggest blue eyes he’d ever seen, eyes that saw everything, eyes he could always read, clear and thoughtful eyes, and sweet, full lips, a soft pink color, and always smelled like flowers and sunshine and happiness.

They’d graduated, and she’d gone away, a full paid scholarship to an ivy league school, far from home. She’d sent him a birthday card, and he’d written her a quick thank you note, and she’d written back, telling him she was finally seeing someone, and he’d stuck it in his dresser drawer – he’d see her soon, and anyway, he hated writing letters. He went a to a local community college, worked at a grocery store, and still lived at home. Both of their parents were so proud of her, it made up for anything he might have been lacking.

And then it was Christmas, and she was home, and he’d gone to her house to see her as soon as his parents had told him. He had started to go to the front, and ring the door bell, then changed his mind, and ran around to the back of the house, and charged in through the kitchen door. She had spun around, her hands covered with flour and bread dough, and let out a gasp of surprise. He smiled and she ran over to him, and he hugged her, and lifted her up and spun her around, and it was like nothing had changed, she had never left, he had never deserted her, and the differences didn’t matter anymore, and he knew know how much he had missed her. But she pulled away, and told him there was someone he had to meet, to stay where he was, she would be right back, and she ran out of the room, wiping her hands on a towel. And a man came in before she came back. He was tall and dark, and moved silently, dressed all in white.

So you’re the one that caused all the damage.

What damage? Who are you? How do you know who I am?

I know you from her. You broke her heart. I am the one that fixed it.

What do you mean I broke her heart? Whose heart?

All these years, she loved you, more than you will ever understand, maybe more than she can understand, and you left her, used her, avoided and ignored her. I repaired the damage as much as I could, but I will never be enough for her. You are all she wants, and all she’ll ever want. You have a connection we will never have, and I want her to have all she wants. She deserves everything and anything.

She doesn’t love me. A girl like that? Please. She needs someone smart, and solemn, someone like her. I don’t deserve her.

She wants you.

And then he had disappeared. And She had come back in. Her golden hair was in a thick braid down her back. He had reached out a hand to Her, and She had smiled, and taken it, and he had kissed her fingers, and She had jerked Her hand away with a scared look in Her ever expressive eyes, and looked over her shoulder. The man came in, and She went to him, and he put an arm around Her shoulders, and She said he was her boyfriend. Surely he misheard Her. And the man showed no recognition. But they had just met a moment before, only his clothes were black. He had been civil to the new comer, but couldn’t help but be jealous, and hadn’t stayed for dinner. He had gone back over the next night, and the man had been gone. She was out sitting in the tree house, and he had climbed up next to Her. And then he had found out she was going to be married. The man had asked her last night, and they had set a date this morning before he’d left. And he had looked at her

You promised to marry me, don’t you remember?

We were eight, Siridean.

You haven’t called me that in years...

Fine – we were eight Dean.

But you promised.

He had sounded like a spoiled little boy, he knew, but he knew her before this other guy had.

I’ve never broken a promise to you before.

She had looked down at her feet, and he realized her hair was down for the first time in years. It had fallen in front of her face, hiding her

Well, you shouldn’t ever break a promise to a friend.

She had looked up at him then, tears coursing down her face, her eyes furious.

You broke every promise you ever made me! And I never said a word. She was yelling now and he had looked down at his hands. Look at me! Every promise you ever made me! And I’ve finally found someone that can help me forget, that had made me forget, until I came back and you sit there telling me what a horrible friend I am. Why can’t you just let me be happy for once? And she had slid down the fireman’s pole and run inside. Her jacket stayed where she had been sitting, and he had picked it up and buried his face in it, knowing how badly he had messed everything up.

Christmas Eve, at church, he had sat in the usually seat, but She sat on the other side of Her parents. He had watched Her through the whole service, Her lips barely parted, eyes swollen, and hair back up its bun. He had tried to talk to Her afterwards, but She had slipped out before he could even stand up, had wanted to tell her that her glance had always made him rethink things, Her voice had been the only thing that could calm him, and that her words replayed over and over in his head, before ever he knew he loved Her. It couldn’t be too late. He would make Her see. This man, She didn’t belong with him. Their parents sat them by each other at the Christmas dinner the next day, and She hadn’t said a word to him. He tried to say something, but didn’t know what, and so the silence stayed between them. That night, he had snuck out, and gone to her window, and threw rocks at the frame. She had finally opened it, and when she saw it was him, she stared at him, with that gaze of hers, that said so much, and his mouth had opened but nothing came out, and so after a few minutes, she had shut it, and gone back inside. The next day, she was gone. She left early that morning, her parents said, her fiancé wanted her to meet his family before the break was over, and she would spend the rest of it with him. He had gone back home, and sat in a bench in the garden, and Bell came, her eyes clouded over and long gone, and laid her head on his lap, and he had cried, for the first time since he was fourteen, and his grandfather died, and even then, She had been the only one that had seen him. She hadn’t said a word, he remembered, only held his hand, and not even bothered to pretend she didn’t notice, and he knew She didn’t care if he cried. Why can’t you just let me be happy for once? But she didn’t love this man, he knew she didn’t, he had always been able to read what was in her eyes, and that wasn’t there.

He went inside, left his parents a note, and took his car. He drove all day and night, and finally made it to the town she went to school in. He ordered a hamburger at a diner nearby, but left everything on his plate exactly as it had been, and went and parked outside her building. He sat all day, and slept all night, and the next morning, her car was a few spaces away from his. He waited outside the door all day, and after a few hours, she came down, and gasped when he stood up in front of her.

Why are you here, Dean?

Because I love you.

You don’t love me, you never loved me, you’re jealous, because I won’t spend my life pining for you.

Never. Never would I want you to pine for me. I never knew.

Whatever, Dean. I have to go.

Please, just let me talk to you.

Leave me alone!

No!

Why?!

I told you! I love you! And she had cried and fallen into his arms, and he had kissed her forehead, because after all, she was still engaged, and then she stepped back, and he took Her graceful hand, and realized that no diamond sparkled there.

You didn’t say yes.

I couldn’t.

He understood?

He knew before I did. He just hoped that...that I would forget.

He smiled at her, and smoothed back her always smooth hair.

But we’re meant to be. And then he had kissed her, not in the way he had kissed so many girls before her, but in a way that told her he meant what he said, and that he would never leave her. They called their parents, and their mother’s had cried helplessly, and even her dad had sounded a little choked, and she had skipped off for the first day in her life, and he bought her a picnic, and told her all the things he had wanted to say, and all the ways she had changed and molded him, and told her a thousand times how sorry he was.

And now he stood, back in the same little church they had spent so many years in, this time on a Saturday, and he looked up as the music started, and she glided down the aisle towards him, glowing like an angel, her hair down around her shoulders, and her eyes shining, and in them he read everything he had ever hoped to read. And in his, she saw the same, because they were eyes she had always been able to read. And after the ceremony, he looked up and saw a tall dark man, dressed all in white slip out the back.

i'm surprised that you've never been told before that you're lovely and you're perfect and that somebody wants you

Fiona was Rhett’s golden angel. He had adored her since their childhood, when his mother dragged him to the hospital to see the newborn. Their parents weren’t really friends, per say, more acquaintances with multiple similar hobbies – the lived in the same neighborhood, and went to the same weekly book club, church, and grocery store. As such, it would have been rude of them not to, especially in Greensville, where everyone went to see newborns. There weren’t many babies there, the community was mostly older, retired people. Rhett and Fiona’s families were more than well off, and lived comfortably. As such, Fiona was the youngest of seven children. All of six of the older children were boys. All were rambunctious and eager to please this new baby sister, and ranged in age from 4 to 14. Rhett was 8, and an only child. Fiona’s brothers caused entirely too much commotion for his liking, and there were too many of them to compete with to be able to hold her, so Rhett watched adoringly from afar. She was his, he knew. Knew somewhere in his little boy heart that she belonged to him more than she would ever belong to anyone else.

He had known from the second he’d clapped eyes on her, his nose pressed flat against the glass of the nursery, standing on tip-toe, struggling to catch a glimpse and so understand what all the fuss was about. It was just a baby, he had admonished his mother on the way to the hospital, and she had laughed and ruffled his hair, but now he understood. She was tiny and perfect, in a way that no grown up, or even little boy, could ever be. Tiny, lovely fingers and toes, and no hair, and soft pink skin, and the biggest blue eyes Rhett had ever seen. Confused, Rhett had asked who Fiona’s daddy was - both of her parents and all six of her brothers had dark eyes, and it hadn’t made sense to him.

“All babies have blue eyes,” his mother said. “Even you did.”

He certainly didn’t believe that. But his mother had said it, so it must be so. She would have blue eyes forever though. No face so sweet could have eyes any other color. He flattened his hands against the glass.

“What’s her name, Mommy?”

here we go round the prickly pear at five o'clock in the morning [parte une]

My parents had a whirl-wind romance [courtship?]. They met six weeks before my father left with a group of his buddies to go off on a Peace Corp mission to save whales in Tajikistan, and wasted no time - they married four days before he left.
Pretty risky business if you ask me - not a lot of rom for changing your mind. Daddy's parents bought them a house as a wedding present. Mom's disowned her.
To listen to them talk, they were the two prettiest people on the planet. Personally, I don't thinik Daddy would have been my type back then. He had a long, dirty blonde ponytail, a hoop in each ear, and a chest and back full of tattoos. The night they met, Mom talked him out of dreadlocking his beard. He talked her out of smoking. He drove a motorcycle and was living with seven other guys in a three bedroom, one bathroom house. I think Gram and Pop were hoping Mom would make him grow up. She claims that what caught her eye first was his rugged jawline. he claims it was his bloody, crooked nose he had just broken in a bar fight. Regardless, that bloody nose was a God-send - Mom passed out at the sight of all that blood, and Daddy had to walk three blocks to the hospital, carring an unconscious girl, bleeding profusely the whole time. Now that's romantic.
Mom wsa tiny and pale, with a chestnut braid to her lower back, and glasses when she read. Daddy still says her brown eyes are the most beautiful he's ever seen. Now don't get me wrong, i love Mama's eyes, but I consider myself lucky to have gotten Daddy's. Ours are a deep, deep sapphire blue, with crinkly little lines at teh ocrners when we smile. His are more pronounced these days than mine. Mom says I have Daddy's smile too - the kind that makes the opposite sex follow you to the end of the earth, she says. I don't know about the last part, but the more like Daddy I can be, the better.
I guess Gram and Pop were right about Mom making Daddy grow up, becaues he quit whatever it was he was doing over seas after three weeks to come back to her. She had the nice little house all set up for them, and eight months later, my older brothers were born - all three at once. There are seven of us now: the triplets; another boy a year later, two years later my twin sister and I, and then one more boy, three years later. There would have been another one of us girls, right after me, but she was born with something wrong with her heart, and as hard as Mom and Daddy tried, they couldn't fix it. I don't think we ever really got over that.
We've always been poor. Mom is an out of work English teacher who teaches care of all of us, and Daddy writes articles for different magazines. We've always been happy though, and never lacked for anything, even if it was just mentioned in passing. Our house was always steeped in love. You could feel it in Daddy's rare hugs when he knew something was really wrong. Taste it in Mama's pancake and scrambled egg breakfasts that we never went a day without. Even when she was sick. And you could hear it in the harmony of Mom and Daddy's voices when they sang to each other while they cooked dinner.


i don't like the last few sentences anymore. I wrote it after i wrote the first part. hmm....