Category: Shorts

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Faint Smell of Cigarette Smoke

There was a faint smell of cigarette smoke. Had she started smoking again? As if to confirm it, the red embers of a cigarette stub lay on the carpet by the skirting of the wall.

The maple side table had been pushed out as if Siobhan was in a hurry. And sure enough she had beaten past me – her shadow took me by surprise when she opened the mud room door and headed to the car.

I tried to ask her about the smoke; and tell her that she needed to be back in time for me to take the bikes to the repair shop – but she’d already slammed the door before I’d started the sentence.

Photo from PickPik.

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The Russian Puppet

She could be Russian, I think, as she holds the door of the motel open for us to continue on through. She’s beautiful with her long bony arms and legs like a raggedy puppet. They move as if disconnected from her body.

Her face, too, is too sharp, her black hair, her pointy nose. And her eyes are large, almost bug like and deep brown. Her skin is stretched taught on those bones, those arms and legs and face, and its coloring is a pale grayish tan, but she’s beautiful you know.

She sympathizes with Liam because we are in the middle of a game and I’m winning because I have the weapon and he doesn’t. She too, knows the game but she is graceful enough to say nothing more about my winning even though she, like Liam, is very good at it and would, like Liam, usually win hands down.

Artwork by CoolArts223 via DeviantArt.

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More Than a Writing Dilemma in a Tarot Card

More than a writing dilemma in a tarot card

Where can I fit destruction into my story?

About my trip to Lantau to see the tarot card reader, when I had to first cut the cards after shuffling them to get a start point. And the destruction card came up, its unfamiliar tower struck by lightning. Maggie French took it and immediately discarded it without analyzing it; even though I knew that it had viciously provided the truth at that moment.

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Brilliant Minds Do Not Care What People Think

Brilliant minds do not care what people think

After a lunch of carrots and an apple the lecturer tells the visitors, “Now we are in the building for analytics and linguistic development… And over there is Kim Spencer, our most brilliant mind.”

The lecturer points at a woman seated behind the glass door of the conference room;  just before she slides her chair out of view.

I remember her from when she was working with us; long blonde film star hair, pointed nose, dark blue eyes, full bust. She is wearing the same low-cut shimmering gold cocktail dress as when she showed up overdressed at the Christmas party. I feel very proud of her and jealous.

I could have done more, could have been part of an academic research group, just like her. Instead I feel disappointed with my career path.

Design by Madame Grès via Kristine on Flickr/Ana Lee, cropped