Hello, Fictioneer readers! I had to take a break from fictioneering last week due to the holidays, and the fact that I was not in the right state of mind to write at that time. I am back, and likely to have a few new stories out soon. But first…today’s Fictioneers story:
copyright Janet Webb
The Winter Long
by Miles Rost
The winter was the longest one that was on record. Cold temperatures kept people inside, the snow sometimes sealed them in like a tomb.
“Honey, do you think we’ll ever be able to leave?”
“Well, sweetie, look out the window.”
They walked over to their window, and looked at a tree with most of it’s leaves on, brown as they may have been.
“Those leaves have stayed on that tree all winter so far. If they can do it, we can do it.”
Honey looked back at her sweetie, smiling bashfully.
“Hold onto me, and I’ll hold on to you.”
Sweetie looked back at his honey, and enclosed his arms around her.
Tina Greene looked out from the cliffside at the ocean’s tantrum. She felt the winds as they blew sea spray into her face. The sea and the spray were very well reflective of her current situation and mood.
She was in the center of a storm in her heart, and the center of a storm in her life.
Her heart felt like it was ripped out of her chest, the crimson effluence pounding out what was left of the life she used to have with her husband, or rather, her former husband. The initial rip came from the delivery of the divorce papers at the summer cottage that they once shared, the site where Tina was currently staying. As she kept reading the papers, she noticed that he left her many things that would keep her pacified, but that the majority of what they made together would be left in his care.
Including their 12-year old daughter, Karin.
A fact that, upon reading, caused her to weep bitterly for hours.
She didn’t care about the summer cottage, or the 1.2 million in money that her husband was willing to part with. She didn’t even care about the half of the pension money her husband would have to give up after he retired. None of that mattered to her, none of it was important.
Her daughter was the most important person in her life at that moment in time, and there was no way she could fight her husband to get full custody. She would lose Karin forever.
It broke her heart.
She looked upon the seas again, seeing the swirling waves crash against the rocks below. She spotted a small dinghy as it crashed into the jetty a little ways off. The cracking and breaking of the wooden hull made a cacophonous echo that reverberated through Tina’s ears.
She looked down at the papers in her hand, the divorce papers that she long agonized over. As she sighed and shook her head, she pulled the pen out of her skirt pocket and signed the bottom. Putting them back into the envelope, she turned and walked away from the cliff, back towards the summer cottage which would now serve as her permanent home. Her new home.
She slowly walked to the back door, taking what old men called a “widow’s walk”, the walk of someone who lost someone or something very important and dear. While she didn’t lose a physical person to death, divorce was just as bad as widowhood.
And it would be something Tina would have to feel for a long long time.
– A tribute to all parents who ended up in divorce, and what they have had to go through in those times.
For as long as he could remember, the streets of the big city were his home. They were the bread and butter he would eat every morning, the cheesesteaks “wit wiz” that occupied his waistline during the afternoons, and the cool air of the night as he drove around the city.
He knew every crevice, every nook of the streets he traveled on. No matter what time it was, he could find a way to get to his destination without worrying about using the GPS in his car. He would take a shortcut if it took a little time off the clock. He grew up on these streets, knowing it was safe to drive at night, and which parts of the city were skeevy enough to avoid in the overnights.
The sound of the lines in the concrete filled his vehicle as he traveled. The staccato of the breaks keeping a steady beat to the music in his head. The interstate was the main way to get to a place, but he always liked to use the side and back roads if possible. This night, however, he needed to be on that stretch of concrete slabs. It was where he was required to be.
He looked up at the tall buildings along the downtown freeway front, of the big pink colored building that the locals called “The Flamingo”; the old Killer Kola factory, which at one time also helped make and store “Billy Beer”; even the double-decker bridge that everyone called “The Iroquois” was able to be seen from his seat. All of these things helped him to realize just how rooted in the city that he was.
The darkness that enveloped the city on this night was palpable. As he pulled off the freeway and onto one of the main surface thoroughfares, he looked around at the area he was about to enter: Old Koreatown. When he first started navigating the streets, Old Koreatown was a place no young man was to go. The area was a mess of dry cleaning shops, liquor stores, shik dangs, and brothels hidden as hair salons. Gangs would make their dough on those streets, and if one wasn’t careful, they could end up in a body bag the next day.
But that was the old Koreatown way.
The new image of Koreatown was the development of high-rise apartment lofts with Korean aesthetics, and trendy coffee shops, or patisseries. It was a gentrified area, lacking the charm of the old neighborhood while still trying to stick with it. Paul missed the old Koreatown, and knew that the new Koreatown was not as good as the old was.
He looked at the signs on the edge of Old Koreatown, and found where he needed to be. He pulled over to the side of the street, next to a stop sign and smiled. He looked to the east, as he saw the faintest glimpses of green and yellow start to tickle the horizon. He started to drift, looking at the beauty of a new dawn.
The rear passenger door opened. Paul looked back and smiled.
“Alright, lady. Where ya wanna go this morning?”
The lady, a striking beauty in the middle of the budding dawn, just sat back and sighed.
“Airport, Terminal H.”
“You got it, ma’am. You’re going to enjoy the dawn as we go.”
She just smiled and settled back in for the long drive.
Paul knew the streets, and this time, he wasn’t in a rush to get his passenger to the destination. He wouldn’t overcharge her for taking the long way and watching the sun rise.
Took last week off because, after the September from Hell that was unleashed upon me, I needed a bit of a break. Now, I’m back to doing what I do, and hopefully will be less tired and do more other writings. Here’s the latest Fictioneers story for y’all:
copyright Rochelle Wisoff-Fields
Kicks by Miles Rost
“I know it doesn’t look pretty, but we’ll do fine with what we have.”
Paul and Mark looked around at the studio, and smiled.
“We don’t care. We’ve got some ideas, and the studio will be fine.”
Mark looked over at the engineers, and pursed his lips.
“Just curious, why didn’t we get the normal studio?”
The engineers smiled.
“Apparently, the last folk that were in the studio,” he chuckled as he relayed what he saw, “They smoked it up in there.”
“Weed?”
“Heroin.”
Paul shook his head.
“Those kicks just keep getting harder to find, man.”
Mark smiled, as he looked at the sheet of music in front of him…
(Author’s Note: If you’re interested in reading the previous four stories of Mayumi, please use the tag “Mayumi” to find her stories.)
Mayumi’s Story (Part V)
“The View From Your Window”
by Miles Rost
3 months at her new job, and she hated it. With a passion.
Contracted for a year, she had to ride out the entire ride while she dealt with all the pressures of whining customers, a boss who was indifferent most times, and unable to communicate properly at the monthly performance meetings. The customers were right, she knew, and she did the best she could to take care of them. However, without the communicative support of her boss, she was not going to be happy until she was out of there.
Mayumi survived the rest of the week, though panicking that she could be let go from her contract at any time. This made her stressed out more than usual, as she was counting on the 1-year longevity bonus to help her pay down debt. It was daunting, as well, as her friend at the station moved onto greener pastures. She was the only one left, and had no other friends at work to talk to.
A 4 day vacation was in the offing, and she was happy to get the time off. A substitute for the show was taking over and she was going to have a few days to relax and rest.
Until day 2. When the pains in her belly started.
Sidelined in her apartment, with not much food to eat as she couldn’t go out to get groceries, she sat in her bedroom. At her desk, she had a piece of paper in front of her and a pencil.
“What can ah write? I wanna write but ah have no clue…” she muttered, as she stared intently at the white sheet in front of her. She took a breath and decided to just take a look out her bedroom window. It was there, and it wasn’t four walls of a dark room, so why not?
She opened the curtains, and looked out. Immediately, she was shocked and surprised.
She looked out the window and saw a beautifully cared-for lawn, freshly cut and beautifully manicured. Close to her was a dark area of ground, with small little green shoots poking up like hairs on a forearm. Lining the fence down the side of the lawn was a series of bushes that reminded her of the lilacs that grew around her family’s home back in Hornsby Shire. She smiled as she saw all of the new beauty that was being created from a space that not even 3 months before was a ramshackle home, which she realized did not look so ramshackle anymore.
The peeling paint of the old house had since gone, and was painted with a fresh coat of brickhouse red. The house’s color fit well with the brick-walled apartments 30 feet from the back door. The trim of the house stood out like the white peppermint of a candy-cane.
Whoever owns that house really wanted to make it noticeable, she thought to herself.
Just as she was about to stand, she noticed the back door open up. She saw a young lady, almost the same age as her, though her appearance was quite shocking to Mayumi. A cherubic face framed by cotton-candy pink hair, with a black t-shirt and black shorts, the young collegian looked to be very punk-like, despite the lack of make-up. She was smiling, as she walked down to the earthen part of the lawn.
She put on a pair of gloves, and picked up a water hose that was nearby. She squeezed the green snake-like hose and a stream of water misted out over the sprouting earth. She laughed as she continued to spray the area, gleefully enjoying her time watering the garden.
As Mayumi watched the young lady, she had thoughts of her home and her dad, an ardent greenthumb. She loved watching him while he worked his hands in the garden, and picking berries from the vines that ran across one part of her family’s property.
She closed the semi-transparent curtains in her room, as she turned to write things from her own heart onto the paper.
Chelsea Paragovian, known to the rest of the world as Chelly Price, looked out the window at the brilliant lights of New York City. The twinkle of the skyline would be incredibly mesmerizing for a first-time girl in the big city. For someone who was there, it was a fading light that reflected the fading spark in her spirit.
Chelly Price was the main attraction for the new millennial musical movement, up there with the Demi Lovatos, Victoria Justices, and others of their ilk. Her first album, made when she was just 17 and a newbie in New York City, had gone platinum within 6 months. She was a hot commodity, and the various backing bands loved having her up front to bring the numbers in. After the concerts, she would swing through the party circuit. Sleep through the day, party all the night, press the flesh at music signings and celebrity appearances on TV shows. Her second album didn’t do as well, but did hit gold within 9 months.
As she looked at herself in the mirror, as the sun came up on that September morning, she finally caught the realization of everything she had been doing. The lines on her face, the premature worry-lines, the stress and the wear of the road was finally getting to her. She had success, she had the money, but she had nothing else.
She had one person left who could bring her back to earth.
She held onto the cell-phone, the flat phone that kept only the most important numbers. She clicked through the hundreds of contacts until she found the one that she was looking for, listed under the letter Z. It had the name “Zero Hour” on it, and she knew that when she called the number, things would never be the same. She clicked the entry, and waited.
One ring. Two rings. Three rings. *Click*
“Hello?”
“It’s me.”
“Chelsea? Sweetie? Is that you?”
“Yeah, Daddy. It’s me. I’m sorry for calling you so early. I know that it’s probably the middle of the night over there…”
She heard a big yawn from the other side of the phone, and started to yawn as well.
“No, no, sweetie. It’s alright. I haven’t heard from you, it’s been so long. So, how is New York treating you?”
“It’s…it’s…it’s alright, I guess.”
“Is there something wrong, sweetie?”
Chelsea hesitated. She knew that if she said the wrong thing, it could doom her future. She believed that if she said something, that it could come to fruition in ways that were never meant to be.
“I looked in the mirror.”
“What did you see?”
“I saw lines. I saw myself as tired.”
“How long have you been doing this stuff that you’ve been doing?”
“2 years. I am due to go into the studios here in the next month to record the third record.”
“What do you think? Do you think you have enough for another one?”
“They keep supplying me with songs, but they’re not really that good. I really want to expand my horizons.”
“Do you remember what I told you when you first left on that midnight plane to New York?”
“You told me that diamond girls aren’t made to grow old.”
“Do you feel old?”
“I look old. I feel tired. But, I know that there’s a spark still in my heart. I just don’t think it’s here.”
She chuckled, thinking that it was silly she was having this discussion with her dad, who was a simple wood-mill worker, not a big entertainment man.
“Maybe what they’re asking of you is not what you want. Have you thought much about what you want to do?”
Chelsea paused. Have I really thought about it? she asked herself, in her mind.
“I am not sure. I am thinking about leaving the parties and the other stuff behind. Maybe refocusing my music, in a way?”
“Honey, whatever you plan to do, I’m behind you 100 percent. Did you hear about Bernie Griffin?”
“Big Bernie? The guy who slung the slats?”
“Yeah. He got drafted by the Dodgers. He’s heading to Florida, I think. He’s gonna be in the minors now.”
“How did he get into baseball?”
“When you saw him last, he was on the high school team. He was at a company baseball gathering, and some guy saw him. Put his name in with a scout, who saw him work, and signed him almost on the spot.”
“Wow. Who would have thought?”
“People thought the same thing about you, Chelsea. They didn’t realize that you were being picked up for a recording contract. A 3 record deal was a big thing for the people around here.”
Chelsea thought about that for a moment, seeing herself like Bernie, and chuckling to herself.
“What I’m trying to say to you, Chelsea, is that you need to do what you think is right. Diamond girls aren’t made to grow old, and you’re my diamond girl. If you think that going a different direction will be a good thing, then trust in what your heart is saying.”
“Daddy, I just need time away from this city. I want to come home for a while.”
“Your bed is ready when you need it. We love you and support you, and if you want to come back at any time, just give us a heads up so we can pick you up at the airport.”
Chelsea started crying right there, on the phone. She knew what she was going to do, and it may have to mean paying the price of her soul with her career.
Don’t forget to visit my latest non-fictioneers fiction piece, called “Trying To Stop Failure “. It could use some love. Anyhow, on with the show…
copyright Adam Ickes
Black Betty (Ram A Lam)
“I remember when I picked that one up. I was out one night with a beauty named Betty. We were about to head back to my place, when this ram came out of nowhere. It wasn’t even a moment after I saw it that I blacked out.”
“What happened next?”
“Well, after I woke up, the ram was dead. My truck was also totaled, and Betty was walking around with a major league concussion. I called up my friend Earl and got him to pick me and the ram up. Betty walked home.”
“What did you do after that?”
“Well, I mounted the ram at the taxidermist and got the head home. I then went to see Betty, and her face was bruised. And that’s everyone now calls her Black Betty.”
Trying to Stop Failure
(aka “Mourning Dove”) By Miles Rost
Part 4 of Mayumi’s story
Months had passed by since the last time Mayumi Shiomi had left her job at Shine FM and went to a competitor. She waited a month, and in that time had great development in her personal life. With one exception…
The men that she had in her life sucked.
She had gone for a good two to three months without even dealing with such an issue, and she was getting better at staying away from situations, but the last guy she met just took her by surprise and she fell, very hard, in love. And got hurt in the interim.
She just broke up with another guy who wanted to use her and abuse her. After the night of their last date, she cried herself to sleep asking for things to finally just stop. That she didn’t want a relationship anymore, and that she needed some “me-time”.
She woke up the next morning, and looked at herself in the mirror. The short sandy brown hair that she used to have had grown a little longer in the months preceding. It was now down to her shoulders, but constantly tied up in a ponytail. She looked a slight bit older than her age, but she didn’t think much of it.
“Ah feel like crap right now,” she muttered to her reflection, “I have no clue what to do, how to deal with all these problems with men. Why…why do I attract that type of man?”
She changed out of her pajamas and put herself under the hot water of a long shower. She thought about where things went wrong, and where in her past was the catalyst for the change she had to deal with constantly. She turned on the waterproof radio that hung in the shower, and tuned it to her new station, Power FM 87. She knew that her show would be on in about 3 hours, and that before that was a great smooth jazz show by her newest friend, Mitzi.
“…and later this week, Larry Carlton will be in Melbourne, playing a 5 date set at Bennets Lane. Here’s a great one from him, going back a few years. This is Mourning Dove, on the Smooth Move show, here on Power FM!”
The start of the music shot into Mayumi’s heart like a needle into a vein. The soft keyboard and the beginning strains of the artist’s guitar nailed the feelings she felt at that time. She was mourning. Mourning her own problems with men, with falling a step behind again, and feeling lower than normal. She just stood under the steady and hard stream of water, as she started drifting into memories.
As the saxophone and guitars harmonized and carried her away, she looked back to the age of 10. She remembered seeing her own father, a man who she barely ever saw in later years. She saw the memory she had of him, smacking her mom around. She remembered him grabbing her mom’s arm and muscling her towards the bedroom. She remembered hearing the sounds, and running to her hiding place in the far part of the basement.
“Is this what ah’m running from?” she asked her 10 year old self, in her mind, “Is this why ah get the men I do?”
Her 10 year old memory looked back at her, saying nothing but showing her a glimpse of what may have happened to give her the perpetual bad luck with men.
She let the music carry her to another part of her mind, the water relaxing her to the point where she could do much more with her soul, mind, and body.
“Lord, ah think we know why things are the way they are,” she said, in a prayerful tone, “Ah’m dealing with the ghosts of the past, and it’s time that we work together on this. Ah wanna be free, and ah know you love me enough to want me to be free. Ah can’t do this alone, and ah have to give it up to you everyday.”
The song’s warm yet sad tones bled across her mind, the prayers she was sending infused with the music’s energy. She had never prayed as hard as she did at that moment, with hot water hitting her tired and stressed out shoulders.
“Father, help me address this problem. The image of my father, ah need to move on from it. Father, help me as ah do what I need to do.”
She kept praying, the water pouring over her hair like a waterfall. She didn’t know what effect her prayer would be, but she realized that she would eventually need to let everything go in a way.
As the song ended and a new smooth jazz song came on, she started her ritual of cleaning, getting ready for work. She felt lighter, but she didn’t know what would happen next.
The Lady In White (Part 2) (aka Close Enough) by Miles Rost
She invaded my mind again. The sight of the Lady in White upon my mind has been a relief, and a worry yet still. It’s been months since the last time she visited me.
In my mind, we were on a boardwalk, a cement waterfront “street” if you will, in Melbourne. I was walking toward her, and she walked toward me. As we drew closer, it was like a camera got closer to us both. After a few close-ups, our hands finally met. She immediately moved over to my shoulder and laid her head down. She felt so warm and looked so lovely, even if I couldn’t see her face.
For a time, we just stood there, my lady in white trying to get in as close to me as possible, and myself wanting to hold her tighter than ever. She leaned up towards me, her skin slightly glowing in the muted sunlight, and gave me a kiss. A gentle, but long kiss. I remember the sensation, like two lightning bolts jolting through my body and a warmth on my lips that permeated all throughout the upper part of my being. It felt like we were floating on air, traveling through the air like a hot air balloon. As we released, we looked back out at the bay…and found ourselves on the steps of the Opera House in Sydney.
I looked down at her and saw the incredible amount of love that permeated from her. It was a beautiful sight of sparkles, flowing pure light from her entire being. It flowed from every pore, every fiber of hair, and washed over me. It wasn’t lust, the red wave of passion that many men and women envision when they think of their chosen other. It was a love that was pure, that forgives everything and heals. The type of love that God has for all of us. She had that, and it poured like transparent sparkly white ribbons over my being. She looked into my face, my eyes, and she gave me a smile that said “I don’t care what you’ve been through, you’re with me. Let it go.”
She turned around and held onto my shoulders as I put my head down on hers, able to relax and feel so much love flow between us. We just looked out at Sydney Harbour, seeing the calmness of the bay. The sun was fully open, and the white dress she wore glowed like snow on a mountain. It was nearly blinding for most people, but for me, it added a glow that was almost angelic. The wind was light, and it flapped the cloth of her dress like a flag. It felt like this was where I needed to be, where I wanted to be forever, and to never go away again.
A gust of wind picked us up and, unlike before in Melbourne, it whisked us off quickly. Like a kite, we flew through the air in a quick way. It felt still, however, as we traveled to wherever this wind was taking us. As quickly as it happened, we landed on a flat Australian beach somewhere, an overcast sky making things a little colder.
She looked back up at me, and put her soft, gentle hands to my face. The soft skin lightly brushed the growing scrub of hair on my chin, and the warmth of them felt like a glowing incandescent light bulb. I felt a tear start to fall from my eye, and I suddenly collapsed to me knees. She fell with me, as I felt the warm tears flow from my eyes onto her shoulder. All the tears of pain, anguish, hurt, released from my eyes, from my being onto her skin. I knew she was strong enough, but this was remarkable that she was able to take all of this pain and anguish, and simply wick it away like oil into a towel. I felt the blackness, the greys of my emotional heart, slowly being pulled from my self.
She pushed me back slightly, and looked into my eyes. Her eyes, of which color I could not remember, communicated unconditional love. Believe in Christ’s love in me, my beloved, they seemed to say, as she comforted me. All that went through my mind at that moment was who this woman was, and how God could make her to be so strong and so forgiving. So loving, that she would be willing to take that pain and shame I had and totally remove it, and still gaze into my eyes and say things without words.
She moved to me again, and pressed her soft lips onto mine. As I realized I was slowly starting to wake, I remember feeling that softness of her lips still pressed upon mine.
I don’t know who she is. I can’t see her face, I only know that she’s the lady in white. What I do know, though, is that she is a woman of unimaginable grace and beauty, of true godliness and forgiveness. I pray that I can meet her. Soon.
Music and Fiction 