RWC #108

APPEARANCES

"You can't always believe what you think you've seen," he'd said.  She hadn't believed him.  The budding relationship had died, plucked before time from the vine and crushed beneath the trampling feet of outrage.  She had spoken furious words full of jealousy and bitter hurt. 

Now that she knew the truth, all she felt was shame...

RWC #98

ERUPTION

Raging deep within,
The wondrous grief of birthing
roars, blood-red, upward.

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RWC #45

LIFE FORM

She read the headline again, and almost spilled the cup of joe she had in her left hand, she was laughing so hard.

"UFO Over NYC"  

She chuckled as she put the paper down.  Oh geez!  All the people freaking out over a light in the sky!  Shaking her head, she finished the coffee and rinsed the mug before drying it and putting it back in the cupboard.  As she got ready for work, she wondered how many of those people who saw the lights actually thought they were seeing an unidentified flying object, Brushing back her very short red curls, she smeared some lip balm over her chronically chapped lips and grabbed her backpack.

No doubt all the talk at work would be about the UFOs.  Well, she knew she could avoid it if she stayed in the mail room.  No one bothered her there, and she was glad of that.  After the last two years, she reveled in the peace and quiet, and most of all, the anonymity, of the mail room.

Hopping off the train at the last stop, she walked briskly through the cold morning air to the laboratory, and passing through the employees entrance, she swiped her ID card and smiled at the security officer stationed there.  He was a pudgy little man, with blotchy skin and a bald head, and the most beatific smile, complete with dimples.  Everybody loved Charlie, and he returned their affection with great good humor and warm acceptance.

"Morning, May!" he said in his surprisingly virile man's voice.  The depth and timbre of it always struck a place inside her like a whip.

Morning, December!" she answered with another broad grin, and waved as she walked away.

Their morning ritual was special to her.  Without Charlie, she was just another face in the crowd.  He made he feel like part of something important - a friendship.  Turning down the long corridor to the capacious mail room, she passed the small secondary morgue, where Joe the Skeleton presided at the door in gruesome splendor.  Suppressing the shiver she invariably felt at this part of the way, she hurried to her place in the mail room just past it down the hall.

As she had become accustomed to it, the absence of anyone else at this hour did not bother her.  As long as the door remained closed, she could live with the knowledge of the dead almost next door. Putting her coat and backpack away in the locker assigned to her, she got to work on checking the sorted mail for the day.  She was scheduled to do the deliveries this week, which meant if anyone had left any sorting undone, she would be late delivering the mail.

A sound at the door made her look up, but it didn't open so she went back to checking that the mail had been sorted by floors, and where required, by offices.  Bulky mail had been placed on the motorized cart for ease of distribution, and she nodded, half an hour later, satisfied that she would make the "morning run" on time.  Checking the watch hanging from the chain around her neck, she saw she had time for another cup of joe before her day began in earnest.

The money for the cup of coffee was already in the snug side pocket of her uniform, and she walked out the door to the coffee machine across the hall from the mail room.  The hairs on the back of her neck stiffened, and she turned, alarmed, but saw nothing.  She stopped in front of the machine and listened, but no reason for her increasing heartbeat was apparent. 

She called out.  "Hello?  Is anyone there?"

That there was no answer did not surprise her.  No one was likely to arrive for another half hour.  She was always the first to get there, so she could do her checks and be ready to roll before the others came, or the press of people who frequented these chilling halls became more than she could stand.  And yet...the feeling that there was a presence there did not leave her.

Shaking her head, and breathing deeply to calm her quaking nerves, she got her coffee and returned to the mail room.  Everything was in order...except for what looked like an aquarium, glowing faintly in the back corner, the darkest part of the room, where neither daylight nor lamp light quite reached.  Gripping her cup for dear life, she walked toward the glow, hesitating a moment to wonder whether or not she should call for backup.

The melodramatic phrase made her giggle nervously, and she chided herself to stop being a ninny and just check out the corner.  Stepping resolutely around the last stack of mail, she felt herself prepared to scream for help if need be.  What she saw stole her breath...and her voice.

No one in the mail room attended to the aquarium till each had gone to investigate its faint glow. And no one else got any mail...

Copyright © 2010 by Teri K D Bannerman

To enjoy other great reads, go here...Challenge #45

RWC #44

MEETING

Max couldn't stand those big, fearful eyes a second longer.  They tore into his soul and ripped him apart.  He swallowed to keep his own tears at bay as he tried to decide what to do.  He hadn't known till that morning, when the package with the letters, legal documents, and pictures had arrived, who this forlorn and frightened little boy belonged to, and when he had discovered it, the weight of the world had pressed in on him. An elephant on his chest would have been a far lighter burden, and the pain much less intense.

He watched as the little boy's eyes welled up, and his pudgy fingers tightened on the ancient railing. He understood the panic that the child must be feeling as they stared at each other.  Why would anyone want to hurt this child?  How could they bring themselves to even attempt it?  Didn't they know who he was?  Didn't they know that he protected the weak, the innocent, and those who couldn't protect themselves?  Didn't they know that he protected his own?  He shook 

"Randy?"  He made his voice as low and non-threatening as he could, but the rusty-nail-on-concrete quality could not be hidden.  Grown men shivered when he spoke, he knew, even when he spoke without anger or threat.  What must he sound like to this innocent?  He was not surprised when the boy did not answer.

"Randy, I know you don't know me, son, but..."  He paused.  How in the name of God was he supposed to say this?  Who in the hell would ever have believed it? Out of nowhere, Darth Vader's dark, angular mask floated into his internal line of vision.  He smiled, hoping that he didn't look like a wild tiger snarling at his prey.

"Randy," he began again, "I am your father."

There, he'd said it.  Not that it made a difference to the cowering child, but at least it had been broadcast to the air, it had been released, given its freedom.  It could never be taken back.  

Randy watched him, and Max could see the emotions warring in him.  He was only three, and he really didn't understand that the reason he was clinging to that old iron railing like a lifeline was that he needed his dad to be there to protect him from the bad men who had been plaguing his life for the last six months.  He didn't realize that he needed to be loved by a man who would show him how to be a man himself one day.  He didn't know he mattered now more than he ever had before. He didn't know Max.

He didn't know...but he would.

Copyright © 2010 by Teri K D Bannerman

For others, visit here: Challenge #44

RWC #43

SHIFT

"It'll only take a moment," he said in my head, staring hypnotically into my glassy eye.  "You won't feel a thing!"

I rolled the eye closest to him, and wriggled like the fish I was then.  Was that supposed to make me feel better?  

"You say that every time!" I complained.  "When will I get to be the bear, and eat you?" I wondered, taking a deep breath in anticipation of the painful end to this game.

"When you learn to shape-shift faster than me!" he answered.  "Now shut up!  I'm in a hurry.  I have a lunch date!"

I heard the crunch...and then the screen went white.

"Same time tomorrow?" Tom asked, as he wrapped his robe tightly around his wide shoulders.  I eyed him admiringly.  He was one big, hunky dude!

"Yes, please!" I answered, smiling up at him.  "I'll get you yet!"

"In your dreams, Pint-Size!"  He returned my smile, his deep brown eyes twinkling. "And don't lie...I know you dream!"  

He chuckled at my expression as he walked out of the simulator.

I hate being assistant to a god!

Copyright © 2010 by Teri K D Bannerman

For more fun, visit this site: Real Writers Challenge #43

RWC #42 ~ "Stupor"

Kitty had never been drunk in all her life.  And she wasn't drunk now - she was sure of it.  She wasn't stumbling around on unsteady legs, or singing bawdy songs at the top of her lungs off key, or picking fights with the little people.  That's what drunks did, wasn't it?  There was her proof!  She was just sitting there, quietly trying to figure out where she was, and what she was seeing. 

 If she were to believe her eyes, there was a giant troll standing before her, with horns like a billy goat lying on his bald head, ears like a fairy, fangs growing up like stalagmites from his otherwise toothless gums, jewelry made of teeth and bones adorning his neck and left wrist, a loincloth of animal skins around his very ample waist, thankfully covering his probably quite scary private parts, and leather strappy sandals tied to the hams that were his feet.  Oh, and he was leaning on a huge bone club.

Well, really!  Obviously she must have hit her head on something, because creatures such as the thing standing before her, scratching his bald pate in a puzzled sort of way, only existed in children's fantasy stories, and were conjured up to frighten the little ones into behaving.  She was not a child, and she had not been misbehaving. And even if she HAD been, a little bit, with that delicious hunk who had come to sit next to her and who had kindly offered to buy her a drink, she hadn't done anything to warrant THIS kid of nightmare!

She turned her head, and wondered what that thing was that was making her cheeks itch. Raising a hand to scratch at it, she screeched at the sight of a paw.  What the heck!  She tried again...and that pesky paw swiped at her face.  What on Earth was going on?  The itch continued to torment her, and the troll stood still, looking as puzzled as she felt.  She looked around her, trying to get her bearings. What she saw confused her even more...

When had she gone outside?  And when did it become day?  She didn't remember going to bed! Heck, she didn't even remember leaving the bar!  That delicious morsel had been chatting her up, and she had felt herself getting more and more turned on by him, but they had still been in the bar till a moment ago...hadn't they?  The sky was bright as day, and the light hurt her eyes.  She squinted...and heard the troll sigh.  At least, she thought it was the troll. No one else seemed to be around.  

This is what she got for going out to a bar on her own.  She, who had never ever been in a bar, except for that one time, with her friend, who had turned out to be a dud as a date, and a total turn-off as a man.  She had been uncomfortable then; why had she ever thought she would be better off on her own now?  She shook her head, and decided that she had better get a move on.  If day had dawned, she wasn't home, that was for sure, and though it WAS Saturday, she would rather be at home, to sort out this confusing turn of events, and get her dull life back under her control.

The seat she was on seemed pretty high off the ground when  she looked down, but she wasn't afraid.  She stood up - on all fours!  WTH???  Now she was really scared! She sat down again, and heard the caterwauling howl that escaped her throat with a distant kind of horror.  She almost sounded like a cat!  Oh God, what was WRONG with her?  Who was the delicious, but obviously dangerous hunk she had been letting chat her up and ply her with drinks?  And where was he now?

The troll moved.  Or at least, it seemed like he did.  She closed her eyes, and opened them again...but the troll had disappeared.  The delicious hunk was back, and staring at her with something akin to concern in his deep brown eyes.  And his lips were moving.

"Kitty, are you okay, hun?"

She stared up at him, and realized she was lying across his lap.  She tried to sit up hurriedly, and felt the world spinning again.  She closed her eyes, and swallowed.  

"Kitty?"  His voice was frankly alarmed now.

She could not speak, so she reached for his face and smoothed her hand over his chin.

"Don't try to sit up, love!  I'm taking you back to your hotel!"

How did he know where she was staying?  And did she want him to take her there? Trying to tamp down the panic rising inside her, and still confused about what was happening to her, she struggled against the waves of nausea, and against his restraining hold, and sat up, weaving on the plush leather seat of the car - a limo, by the looks of it.  She had not accomplished any of the goals of her evening, except meeting a sexy hunk.  She had met one, all right...but what if he was really a troll?

Copyright © 2010 by Teri K D Bannerman

To read other entires, visit the site: Challenge#42

Real Writers #41

WINTER DAWN

Morning,

and the heavy clouds of smoke

furl upwards

into the lightening air.

Warming,

and golden beams of sunlight 

stain the clouds

and rim the spreading smoke.

Baring

still-dark veins against the sky,

stands the oak,

bearing itself erect.

Copyright © 2010 by Teri K D Bannerman

To read more, visit this site: Challenge #41

RWC #39

CRISIS

The wrist band said "breathe."  He opened his eyes slowly again, and checked to make sure that he had read it right.  "breathe", it said.  He tried...inhale.  Oh my, but that hurt!  Exhale quickly.  Inhale, but not deep.  Still hurt, but not as bad.  Exhale.  The things at the other end of the room were a blur to him.  Was that a door?  Where was he, again?  He tried to focus, but his eyes weren't functioning properly.  In fact, the only thing that seemed to be functioning normally, aside from his mind, which was in a state of panic, was his lungs, though he feared he had broken some ribs.

He tried to focus his mind, to take shallow breaths, so his brain would get enough oxygen so he could concentrate.  The last thing he remembered was the phone ringing.  He couldn't remember who had called.  And then he woke up here, on the floor, far from lucid, and hurting. He hated being unable to help himself.  He was a man, dammit, he should at least be able to get himself to a phone.  His disgust at his weakness puffed past his lips as he exhaled again.

He thought about his children.  Three of them all grown, the youngest just out of college. What if they never found him?  What if he died before anyone noticed he was missing?  He had not always been a kind father.  In fact, as he lay there, trying to feel his feet, he remembered the many times he had made their lives a living hell.  He knew they resented him, even if now they were grown they understood his way.  He suddenly wished he could take back some of the harsh words he had spoken to them, and given them more of his time, his patience, and his love.

Breathing was becoming more difficult now, even shallow breathing.  He puffed carefully, trying to stem the rising panic that threatened to swamp him.  He had to keep breathing till help came.  He berated himself for not letting his daughter get him the "child minder" as he had called it then.  If he had it now, he could press the button, and someone would have been there already.  Stupid pride!  It would be the death of him!

Best not to think about death.  he was old, but he wasn't ready to die.  The great beyond could wait a while longer.  He had no one there who wished to see him.  He thought with regret of the mother of his children.  He had loved her, but he had never known how to show her.  He supposed she could not be blamed for thinking his work was more important to him than she was.  But he never understood why she couldn't see that he was doing it for them, for their future.

They never had a future.  Once she started relying on his brother, and he let it happen, their marriage was over.  No use to lie to himself now, though at the time he was blind with fury.  He really had screwed up his life - the love of his life lost to him, a brother estranged, and children who hated his guts.  

The emotions he had fought his whole lifetime not to feel welled up inside him.  He struggled to hold them back.  He had to breathe, to live until someone came to find him.  He couldn't waste his breath on feelings.  They would only cause him more pain.  He couldn't afford any more pain.  He couldn't feel his legs, but his arms hurt, and his neck - and breathing hurt like a bitch.  Where was help?  Why had no one come?  How long had it been?

He looked over at the wrist band again.  Whose was it?  Where was he?  He couldn't remember, though he pushed his mind to think. Was this what Alzheimer's was like?  Did he have Alzheimer's?  Why couldn't he remember?  He felt the panic rising again, and he cried out with the pain of it against his broken ribs.

"Mr. Holley!  Mr. Holley!  Are you in there?"  He heard the voice, a door creaking, and then footsteps.   

Breathe.  He must remember to breathe.

Copyright © 2010 by Teri K D Bannerman

For more, read here--->Challenge 39

RWC #38 (37B)

SONG

"Somewhere, over the rainbow, way up high, there's a land that I heard of once in a lullaby!" The little girl sang the words quietly, her voice sweet, in tune, lush, for one so young.  She brushed her doll's hair, and braided it as she sang, "Somewhere, over the rainbow, blue birds fly. Birds fly over the rainbow.  Why, then, oh why can't I?"

It was raining up in the mountains, and she could see it coming down to wash the valley, to rid it of the last snows of winter.  She could hear her mother and her big sister outside talking as they hurried to take the washing off the line.  She looked up at the view outside her window, and hummed the song some more.

"It's a beautiful rainbow, isn't it, Amy?"

The voice made her jump up quickly, dropping the dusky-faced doll where she had been sitting to throw herself gleefully into the arms of the man who stood just inside her door, smiling at her.

"Uncle Dan!  Uncle Dan!" she screeched in excitement, and hugged his neck tightly, gifting him with a smacking kiss on his dimpled cheeks.

"Hey, Pigtails!"  Daniel Collins dropped his bags and hugged the little girl, kissing her soundly on both cheeks.  "Boy, have I missed you!"

"I missed you, too, Uncle Dan!"  Amy pulled her face away to peruse his whiskered one, and the look on her face made him smile wider.

"Keep looking at me like that, and you're bound to get your candy sooner rather than later!" He chuckled as she laughed merrily, and wriggled her way down and out of his arms.  Pulling him along with her, she raced as fast as she could go with a six-foot-six 250-pound man in tow to the back door, where her mother and sister were just entering, a few minutes ahead of the rapidly approaching rainstorm.

Miranda, her sister, put her basket down and rushed as elegantly as a teenager would over to her favorite uncle, hugging him and letting herself be kissed.

"Prettier every day, Miranda!  Will I have to ride shotgun while I'm here?"

Miranda blushed prettily, but he knew she was pleased at his compliment.  "I don't have anyone you need to protect me from, Uncle Daniel!" she answered with a sedate smile.  "The boys aren't interested in me."  There was no wistfulness in her tone, just a plainness that told him she was okay with that.

"Then they're all blind, or stupid, or both!" he declared.

"Wade likes her, Uncle Dan, but she doesn't give him the time of day!"  Amy made her pronouncement with typical childlike enthusiasm at having said something grown-up, and having added to the conversation in a meaningful way.

Daniel watched his older niece frown slightly, and then remove all expression from her face. Hmmm...something to find out more about, he thought, and turned his attention to their mother.  Joy Collins was the most beautiful woman he had ever known, and his deep love for her was unabated.  That she was his brother's widow was only one reason he did nothing more about his feelings than watch out for her and the girls, and come for a visit as often as he could.  

The other reason was that he did not know how she felt about him, and he knew if she knew the feelings he had been harboring for her for all the time he had known her, she would have barred him from her home.  She had been married for ten years before Rick had died in a fiery collision on the Interstate.  Now, a year later, he was home on leave from duty, and as always, his first stop was her home.  He watched her now as she put her own basket down slowly, and turned to face him.

"Dan!  How lovely to see you!"  Her smile was as warm as her voice, but he noted that she avoided his eyes.

"Always a pleasure to come here, Joy!" he said, keeping his tone and his words light.  He reached for her, and she bestowed a light peck on his cheek before moving away, and he let her go with only a small, light, one-handed hug.

"I was about to serve lunch when we noticed the storm coming," she said, "so you're just in time!"  She went to the counter, where she had begun to lay out food. "Girls, help me set the table while your uncle washes up."

"Same room, Joy?" he asked.

"Yes!  Don't hurry!  There's still the sandwiches to make!"

Dan turned away, retrieving his bags on the way to what he had come to call "his" room.  It was small and neat, a double bed, prettily spread with a rainbow-colored blanket, sheer curtains at the windows, and a chest of drawers with a single yellow rose in a bud vase atop it. He threw his bags on the bed and went into the small adjoining bathroom, deciding to remove only his uniform shirt, and put on one of the black tees he favored.  By the time he walked back into the kitchen, there were three place settings, and soup was being carried to the table to complete the lunch settings.  There were sandwiches in a plate in the middle, a jug of what looked like lemonade, spoons, and three glasses.

"Would you like coffee now or later?" Joy asked, motioning him to sit in the chair his brother had always sat in.

"Probably later, thanks!"  He smiled at her, and swallowed the emotions that had been threatening to swamp him from the moment he had walked up the path to the front door.

"Uncle Dan, have you ever walked to the end of the rainbow?"

Amy's question shook him out of his reverie, and he chuckled at her.  "No, Pigtails, I haven't! And I doubt anyone has!  Why do you ask?"

"Can we say grace first, please?  I'm starving!"  Miranda brought them to attention, and after she hurriedly said grace, Amy said,

"Well, don't they say there's a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow?"

"Yes, but that's just a story, little one!"

The little girl seemed to ponder that as she ate her sandwich first, obviously waiting for the soup to cool.  The rain, which had come minutes before, pounded down on the roof, the windows, the earth, and the dark it brought was such that they had to switch on the lights to see.  

"It's gone," Amy said suddenly.  "The rainbow's gone!"

"Well, it's storming now, sweetie.  The sun has to be out for there to be a rainbow," Dan explained patiently.

"You mean it's not there all the time?"  She seemed particularly offended by that possibility.

"I'm afraid not, Pudd!" he answered, finishing his soup, and swallowing the last of his lemonade.

"So the song is wrong then?" she asked, her soup forgotten.  "Birds can't fly over the rainbow?"

How on Earth was he supposed to answer that?  He looked up, and found Joy's eyes on him, piercing, swirling with emotions he did not understand.  He swallowed the sudden lump in his throat and said,

"Well, remember how we talked about the world of our imagination last time I was here?" he asked.  

"Yes," Amy replied, and got up from her chair to come and sit in his lap.

"Well, in that world, birds can fly anywhere they like, and so can we!  But it's only there, Pigtails!  Only there!"

"And there's a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow there?"

Dan smiled into her hair.  "Absolutely, Pudd!"  He pulled her away from his chest to say, "Now, if you finish your soup, I'll give you one of the special candies I've brought home just for you!"

His eyes wandered out the window to look at the mountain in the distance, and watched with a kind of awe as a splash of color began to hover over it, gradually deepening as he stared, as fascinated as his niece would have been had she seen it.  The sounds of rain slowed above and around him as the rainbow strengthened its hold on the sky, and he felt as though he was experiencing a kind of renewal, as though something significant was happening to him. He realized with a start that he had never seen a rainbow begin.  

"Look, Amy!" he said, directing the child's gaze out the window.  "It's back!"

There was no hope of getting her to finish her soup now.  She jumped up to peer out the big bay window, and soon he heard her humming again.  His eyes went back to Joy, standing before the sink, rinsing the dishes before stacking them in the dishwasher.  He was not aware of Amy leaving the room, nor of Miranda taking the laundry to the adjoining room to fold.  He could only watch Joy, and think how much he wished the world of HIS imagination could somehow make it into this world, into this kitchen.

"Birds fly over the rainbow.  Why, then, oh why can't I?"

Dan smiled at the exuberance of Amy's voice as she belted out the final words of the song. Why not, indeed?

Copyright © 2010 by Teri K D Bannerman

For others, read here------>RWC-37

RWC #37

BULL RIDER

The little boy slid nonchalantly onto the back of the huge beast, his staff in his hand, unaware of his audience.  I snapped a few more shots of him.  He was unconcerned, as much so as the creature upon whom he perched, a David on Goliath's back.  I watched him as he stared with curious concentration into the distance.  I knew what he saw.  I had seen it too, but my response to it was nothing near as quietly composed as his appeared to be.  Nor as disinterested in the way of children whose curiosity may be peaked without any attached importance being given to that which makes them want to see.  It was not an event to spark any other than passing curiosity, even the piercingly intent kind that marked the way of a child.

I watched him settle himself on the back of the ox, which kept its own counsel as it tore the grass and swallowed, oblivious to all but the call of its first stomach.  An idle thought flitted through my mind...aside from the lean kine in the Old Testament story, I had never seen or heard of a thin cow.  And yet, all it ate was leafy green "veggies".  The absurdity of my wayward thought brought a rueful smile to my lips, as I turned my attention in the direction of the boy's gaze.  The cloud of smoke that rose into the morning sky was far enough away that he knew it was not his village.

What he did not know was that the ones who caused that smoke were headed his way, and soon his peaceful morning rides would forever be interrupted, discontinued, and he himself, if not a corpse, might be a refugee, wounded, lost, apart from those who cared for him.  I sighed for the loss of his innocence, and wished I could do more than record its end.  But I was not a soldier.  My job was to record events for posterity, so others could learn from the mistakes of their neighbors, and possibly avert another catastrophe.  This was the order of the world.  I struggled with my cynicism as I walked away.

I could not save this bull rider, but I could preserve his memory, if nothing else...

Copyright © 2010 by Teri K D Bannerman

Read others here----->Challenge 37