I could get lost in my small hometown when it rains. A whirling dervish of directional confusion. How I made it out of the state, I’ll never know.
5
Herder of Memories
These were people’s memories that I saw. Some were pleasant. Others not so much. People carried a lot in them, stories you’d never even imagine were real or possible. My father used to sometimes tell stories back in the village. He’d always say a good storyteller renews the story with each telling, weaving in memories and personal experiences to subtly change it and make it a new story.
Gardenia
In her old life, her eyes would have been anxiously scanning the room, searching for flaws. Was there enough food? Were the flowers fresh enough? Were the guests having a good time?
Other People’s Problems
Marissa leans a little closer, uses her confidential voice, though she’s pretty sure even his good ear doesn’t work so well these days. And he probably isn’t paying attention. Around them people are eating dinner. Chairs are being slid in and out at tables. Low voices like pillows buffer an occasional impatient “what?” and the frustrated response, “I. SAID. THIS. IS….”
Glass Spiders – Editor’s Pick
It begins with a splintering intersection of time and reality. The world shatters, seeks to cobweb, to consume the glass coffin that encases and confines. I inhale and hold and pray, but forget what I’m praying for? The sensation stalls like a pinched vein unable to release the life-giving blood within. But it hasn’t stopped. Not really.
Kind of True – Editor’s Pick
It was her customers who had started the whole acting thing. Almost every night at Chiro’s when she took their orders she was asked if she was an actor or dancer or grad student. Was it her fault that patrons, especially tourists, expected that a young server working (only temporarily!) in a Chelsea trattoria, would be headed for a big career?