The messenger

He came for me that night. I knew it was my time, but I was still not prepared forhis arrival. The message was clear. I packed my baggage and followed him out the door. He smiled a sad smile and I took one last look at the house I had lived in for the last forty years. It was lovely with the rising sun glinting off its windows. I had been happy there and had lived a good life. I turned back to death nodded my head and reached for the hand he held out to me.

Secret Ingredient

It happened so fast that when it was over they were both shocked. The body laid on the carpet in the middle of the living room. Phil started to freak out repeating over and over again,
"Oh no!"
Thomas had to slap him several times to calm him down.
" Look, this is bad and we have to remain calm to decide what we need to do!" Thomas said
" I can not go to jail, I will not do well in jail!" Phil shrieked
" Don't worry I know someone who knows someone who can help us out." Thomas said
Thomas went to the phone dialed and waited. Phil watched in both anguish and hope. After Thomas hung up the phone he said,
" Don't worry it will all go away."

Twenty minutes later there was a knock at the door. Thomas answered and standing on the door step were five of the youngest, clean cut, decent looking boy scouts you had ever seen. Thomas said,
" Thank you so much for coming it is great to meet you guys, I am Thomas and this is Phil."
The oldest of the scouts stepped forward and said,
" We have never met and we were not here, now sit quietly on the sofa while we clean up this mess." the scout then began to shout out orders to his patrol, " Lay out the tarp, get the rope, make sure the knots are secure, ready the bleach."
In twenty minutes the scouts had securely wrapped the body and cleaned up any traces of blood, they hoisted the body up and prepared to leave. The Patrol leader looked at Thomas and Phil and repeated his warning,
" We have never met and we were never here!"
As the scouts carried the body out of the apartment Thomas and Phil could faintly hear them singing:
Softly falls the light of day as our campfire fades away,
Silently each scout must ask, have I done my daily task,
Have I kept my honor bright, can I guiltless sleep this night,
Have I done and have I dared everything to be prepared.
Phil and Thomas never saw those scouts again and to this day 10 years later that body has never been found. Thomas sometimes wonders how they made it disappear.

A group of scouts sits around a campfire with their Scout master, the Scout master is finishing his second bowl of Chili, he turns to the Patrol Leader and says,
" Kenny I don't know how you do it, but this chili is amazing, won't you give me the recipe?"

The Alchemy of Love

She dreamt about him every night, the boy in that uniform. When he told her he was leaving he was so exited and proud that she did not say a thing about her fears. She had loved forever. They had played together in the courtyard when they were small and now he was far away in a foreign land, fighting for their country. She was proud as could be that her man was a dough boy fighting for what was right, but when she was alone in the room she had shared with her sister, before she married and moved across the city, she would weep into her pillow muffling the sobs so her parents could not hear her. Every night the dream was the same. Him and her playing the courtyard side by side, her with her dolls and him with his toy soldiers. It was summer and she wore a yellow sun dress with a green ribbon in her hair. She had worn the ribbon for him. At eight she already knew he was for her and everyday when she picked a ribbon for her hair she would think about him and weather he would like the color. So on the day she went to meet him upon his return from the war she wore a bright pink ribbon knowing that it was his favorite and she knew that he would have smiled, so when they lowered his flag draped casket off the ship she did not cry, but wore a bright smile to go with the pink ribbon.

The Book

I read it for the first time when I was 12. It changed everything. It opened my eyes and made me realize that the world was not the place I had thought. She kept it hidden in a secret comparmtent in the bottom drawrer of her dresser. When I found it, I knew that I should not read it, but I could not resist. It shattered me into a million pieces. Over the years I would sneak it out and read it over and over. I am sure she never knew for if she had she would have seen that I looked at her differently. She would have seen it in my eyes. She would have seen that I no longer looked at her as just "Mom". On that day when I was 12 and read all her secrets, she became more to me, she became flesh and blood, an actual woman. It changed everything.

The Fluency of Corn

When I was a teen-ager I dreamed of getting out of there. The dreams were filled with big cities, exciting jobs and fascinating people. I saw myself there in the gleaming city, dancing, working, loving and living the life I knew I was destined for. I did not see myself staying there in that town surrounded by corn, stifled by it, drowned among it, wasted by the corn. So it shocks me each time I pull off the express way to visit my parents, how it draws me in that corn; the smell of it, the sound of it, the look of it as the moonlight bounces off the glistening ears. It sometimes creeps into my dreams the way the city did before I lived in it, luring me back to that town I swore I would leave forever.

"When Pigs Fly"

I saw a pig fly today. I was walking down the path I always take past Farmer Pendleton's farm and I kid you not, a pig with wings flew right by me. Then crashing through the brush I see Timmy Thompson chasing the flying pig. He screeched when he saw me, stopping and panting for breath.

" Hullo, Miz Simmons, " Timmy wheezed, " Bessy and I were just practicing for the costume contest this week-end at the festival, she got a little irritated with the wings and ran off, you did not happen to see which way she went did you?"

I pointed down the path and Timmy took off at a run. I turned back heading north on the path shaking my head, Bessy was not the first pig I had seen fly and I suspected she would not be the last while living in this little frontier town called Hell, which held an ice festival each year called 'Hell Frozen Over', complete with a flying pig costume contest. At least living in Hell was never dull.

A Clear Message?

The message was clear, "Meet me at the corner of Fifth and Sheridan at 2 pm, tell no one." She stood on the corner of Fifth and Sheridan and waited. It was now 2:30 and still he was not here. She had begun to fidget and check her watch every 30 seconds at 2:15. Where the heck was he and why had he sent that ridiculous note. At three she left, cursing his name, the day she met him and her own stupid hormones that had got her tangled up with him. Really in the year she had known him they had fought more then they got along. She was a fool for even responding to his note. It had been almost a month since she last saw him. She was wasting her time. He was never going to change.

He stood in the shadows of the building across the street from the corner of Fifth and Sheridan where he had told her to meet him. He watched as she kept checking her watch and started fidgeting. He knew by 2:30 she would be cursing the day she ever met him. She was so beautiful standing on that corner waiting for him. They could have been really good together, but he was destined for other things. When he had attended the CIA recruitment event at college he never expected his life to turn out this way. He took one last look at her as she checked her watch as he turned away, slipping into the shadows of the alley knowing he would never see her again.