Patchwork People XXVIII Departures
- 2 years ago
- 76
- 0
XIX. First draft people. An occasional bat flickered across the stars overhead. The gardenias and hibiscus had long drawn in their petal- awnings. Across the lawn, the hunched bushes looked like a queue of black-robed monks marching back to their monastery. And in the middle distance, fireflies marked a secondary night-sky of transitory constellations in what might have been an even more unpredictable universe than the one we find ourselves inhabiting, one that blinks in an out of...
IV. The big fat middle of nothing. Outside the bus window the night was something solid and impenetrable, not a star to be seen, only an occasional porch light burning on some farmhouse miles in the distance. For hours now they'd been passing through endless blind tracts of dark country, where shockingly few people lived, but Phoebe could still feel the cows out there in the night, watching, chewing, uncomprehending. Cows, cows, and more cows, that was her impression of the great...
XVII. Hell's Angel Walt was in the workroom of his shop when she called. He was putting new brake cables on a Rivendell Sam Hillborne. He was customizing the bike for one of his more well-heeled patrons, a dentist who fancied himself a cycling aficionado. He was the kind of guy who outfitted himself like he was racing in the Tour de France just to tool his way through the park. He always bought the very latest, most cutting-edge gear. Everything high-tech and top of the line. But he spent...
XXX. Book of changes. One morning Marcia came into the Blue Cat and found Grace packing up the snow-globe collection. She carefully wrapped each plastic globe in newspaper before nesting it inside a box beside the others. "What happened? Did Mrs. Pritchard have second-thoughts about selling?" Marcia's eyes widened in disbelief. "Don't tell me you got a taker for the entire collection?" "Neither, I'm afraid," Grace said. Marcia began setting out that morning's baked selections....
IX. The momster. Her whole life Phoebe's biggest fear was that her Mom would die suddenly and without warning. Even as a little girl, she was kept awake with nightmares that seemed to foretell his horrible event in detail. She remembered anxiously watching her mom sleep, afraid that she might stop breathing, nudging her awake just in case. How cranky she would be! "What!" she'd bark, snorting and spluttering. "What's the matter with you? What time is it? Why aren't you in bed?" It...
V. The diner on memory lane. The last time Marcia had spoken to anyone in her family it was to her brother Matt. That would be winter five years ago. They met in a 24-hour diner by the side of a highway in Metuchen, New Jersey. Pointedly, it was a restaurant Matt had never visited and no doubt never intended to visit again. Through a series of emails and two brief phone calls, she had explained the general situation and Matt's reaction had grudgingly advanced from "this has got to be...
XVIII. Beauty and the beast. So I finally got to meet the boyfriend. Surreal! He was one of those big, burly, biker-types. His arms (and who knows what else) covered in tats, the seriouso kind. I'll bet anything some of them are prison tattoos. Long gray hair tied back in a grizzled ponytail. Grizzled beard, too. He was exactly the kind of guy that every dad shudders to imagine his daughter will bring home one day. And here my dad was bringing him home to me! See what I mean by...
XXI. Full Xanax moments. Her heart skipped a beat before her brain was fully conscious of the reason. There'd been a total communications blackout between them of several years running but Marcia recognized Claire's old email address immediately. She remembered, too, clicking open the message, the standard post-divorce tone of Claire's emails: terse, authoritative, and demanding. Then, as now, Claire communicated with Marcia as she would with a subordinate whose compliance was taken...
VI. The perfect pie crust. The windows were dark, covered with condensation. Inside, at the kitchen table, Marcia pressed the heel of her hand against the back of the santoku knife and cleaved the apple in half. Fuji, this time. There were five other apples prepared on the cutting board, skinned an unearthly greenish-white, already tarnishing. She was making an apple pie for the Blue Cat. "I still don't understand," Grace had said. "What you've got against birthdays. What's so...
XIII. Lame burger. The bus that was supposed to bring Phoebe to Hope Crossing came and went with no Phoebe on it. Only a handful of passengers disembarked from the coach. A tall, elderly, stoop-shouldered man with a sharp-featured face descended first. He took a quick glace around, readjusted his grip on a battered suitcase, and trudged up the street. He was followed by a stout, middle-aged black woman in a church-lady pantsuit. Behind her were two children, chattering, bickering,...
X. The amoeba life. In the stories of people she admired, there was always a defining moment, a dramatic event that summed up their lives to a critical point and provided the pivot for a new life to come. Marcia would like to have had a similar "defining moment" in her life, but it struck her that her life not only lacked a defining moment, but that it really didn't have any definition at all. It was a more amorphous thing, her life; if it advanced, and that was often in doubt, it...
XIV. Gimme shelter. "You live in a garage?" They were standing on the little concrete square outside the front door, staring up together at a tidy two story structure that, modifications notwithstanding, still, in fact, looked very much like a garage. "Well, it's not exactly a garage. Actually, It's a converted carriage house. I'm just renting. The woman I work for owns it. She lives in the main house across the garden." "A carriage house? What's that?" "It's where they used...
XVI. Buried Secrets. First thing I do on that first day is I take a detour through town to check out this totally demented store where Marcia mentioned she has a job. What kind of a job, I can't quite imagine. From what I can tell, it sounds like something super low-ambition, some not-trying-too-hard menial position that can't possibly pay very much. Given my main reason for showing up here in Hope Crossing, that doesn't bode well for the future of yours truly. You can imagine my...
XXV. Who's your daddy? When they asked me at the hospital who my parents were, who my emergency contact was, I guess you can say that I kind of panicked. They were making it pretty clear they weren't going to let me out of here on my own, no way, so I had to come up with someone. Who could I finger for the honor? Mom was out of the question, at this point, and once Marcia found out that I'd lied and basically stolen her money, which I'm sure she must have realized by now, she wasn't...
VII. A bicycle built for two. Everyman's Cycles looked like a bicycle field hospital. Wherever you looked bicycles, or parts of bicycles, stood, leaned, or lay in various states of distress, awaiting Walt's attention. He'd get to each of them, eventually, in his methodical, patient way. Walt took in stray bicycles the way crazy old ladies collected cats. Most of them were rescues. Bicycles he found abandoned in fields, weeds growing through their spokes. Or locked for months to streets...
XI. A ghost and a riddle. Night again. Bus travel made her sleepy, but only during the day it seemed. She traveled through the night hours wide awake. Phoebe could see her reflection like a ghost super-imposed over all that limitless darkness. She felt like a ghost, too, like something not quite real, a figment of someone's imagination. But who's? She was a ghost floating across the countryside to haunt a person who'd run as far away from her as possible. What brought her back...
XX. Glass houses. To the sadly uninitiated, a bicycle is simply a convenient means of transportation, low-tech, eco-friendly, inexpensive, ultra-democratic. For the fitness conscious, it's a superior form of practical exercise: you could get your aerobic workout and run errands at the same time. For others, the bicycle endures as the conveyance of childhood memories--tricycle, Big Wheels, training wheels, scraped knees and paper routes. However to someone like Walt, a bicycle was all...
XXII. The x factor. It was a strange council they made that evening sitting on Grace's porch. Walt and Marcia, Claire, and, of course, Grace herself, puttering about busily, trying to make everyone comfortable. It brought to mind those old photographs of Yalta, where Stalin, Roosevelt, and Churchill posed with forced congeniality for the camera, the most unlikely and unnatural of allies, each of them knowing full well that their cooperation was only temporary. That the moment the...
XXIII. Strange geography. They really should teach more geography at school, that's what I'm thinking. I mean, I've got to get to New Mexico, but I'm not even sure where it is. In the Southwest, somewheres, which is good enough to say, if you're living two thousand miles away in New Jersey and have no intention of ever actually going there. I don't even know if it comes before or after Arizona. I'm in Oklahoma now, a really godawful place from what I can see of it, which isn't...
XXVI. The great escape. One could imagine a thousand things going wrong, but there was no hitch at the hospital. Their quickly improvised charade worked like a charm. Walt's performance as Phoebe's concerned but understandably angry father was spot-on. Marcia, in her supporting role as distraught mom, hadn't had to act at all. There were the usual papers and forms to sign, a brief interview with a representative from the Chupadero police department and another with a representative...
XXIX. When cows fly. There are no cows outside the window at thirty thousand feet, no oil drills, no billboards, no fast food chain restaurants either. Nothing but space, space, and more space. You always expect to see things clearer on the way back from a journey. I'm not sure if anything is really different than it was before, but I do see it differently, and maybe that makes all the difference. We'll just have to wait and see. I'm not so mad anymore, I guess. That's one thing...
Author’s Notes: ‘Patchwork Knight’ is set in the Sweet Dreams universe, but is otherwise a standalone story. *** ‘Patchwork Knight’ *** Does everyone remember their first crush with such clarity? Forgetting his is impossible, and if he were honest with himself, he would acknowledge that she is the standard by which every other woman that he has admired or dated is judged, and has found them lacking. He knew that he was not the only one who fell in love with her in those glory days of high...
VIII. Snowballs in paradise. Grace was unpacking a snow-globe collection from all fifty states that Mavis Pritchard had brought into the shop the day before. "Look at this," she said, holding one up with a hula girl and a palm tree inside. "There's even one from Hawaii. "Hmph. Snow in Hawaii. Who would imagine something like that?" "Someone who'd never been to Hawaii?" Marcia suggested. Grace turned the globe over. "Made in China. Well that explains it, I guess." She gave it...
XII. Mirror, Mirror. The woman framed in the glass wore a flower-print silk skirt, a white blouse, and a light black sweater cinched tight above the waist. It was the sixth outfit she'd considered that morning, not counting the dozen or so she'd tried on mentally, rejecting them one after the other with a shudder of second-guess horror before they even made it out of the closet. "What do you think about this? Too frumpy, right?" Walt was sprawled on top of the bed, head propped on...
XV. Breakfast club. Sunlight poured through the checkered curtains of the kitchen window. The sliced bananas and butter were simmering on the stovetop. Marcia added to them spices she'd already toasted--cinnamon, nutmeg, clove. Together they filled the carriage house like incense. This was the Church of Home and she was performing the celebration of Good Morning. She measured out a half-cup of white flour and poured it into the mixing bowl. In another bowl she whisked three eggs, a...
XXIV. Cactus country. The day was cool and clear. An auspicious day for new beginnings. The cloudless sky stretched tight, a blue tarpaulin snapped to the horizon. It was almost enough to give Marcia a feeling of hope. Between all the preparations, hastily made as they'd been, throwing together a pair of travel bags, gassing up the truck, collecting maps and whatnot, they were on the road a little later than they'd planned. Traveling south on I-640, traffic was still light but picked...
XXXI. The wisdom of ghosts. Edgar Birdwell was an awful poet. There was just no two ways around it. It wasn't only that his language was stilted and clunky, antiquated even in his own day, or that his themes were self-censored, disguised in tortured euphemisms to the point of utter obscurity. He was simply a bad writer. There was a good reason he was self-published. Who else would? Birdwell had an ear with more tin in it than a can. Marcia's fantasy, ex- graduate student of...
XXXII. Welcome home. Autumn was now more than just a hint of wood-smoke in the nippy air of a summer evening. The trees had turned and the leaves were in free-fall. In the night sky, the constellations had subtly shifted position. The stars were sharper. The frogs and crickets had grown quieter. "Good evening ladies." Walt waved to them as he cruised passed the porch on the tandem. He was showing up all over town lately riding solo on that bicycle. He was becoming famous for it....
Pyare Doston Main, aap ki Julee, phir se aap ke beech hun aur pesh karti hun apni Chudai ki Dastaan ka agla bhaag, Do Chut Rani, Ek Lund Raja. Padhiye aur maza lijiye is samuhik sambhog ka. Yahan par main aap sabhi padhne walon ka dhanywaad karna chahti hun jinhone Meri Chudai Ki Dastaan ko pasand kiya aur apne comments mujhe mail kiye. Padhne walon ke beech itna prasiddh hona mere liye bahut garv ki baat hai. Ye bhi sach hai ki popular hone ke baad jalne walon ki taadaat bhi badh jaati hai....
You tell yourself that you've given up, that you've lost all hope; you tell yourself often, until you half-believe it yourself; not because it's true, but because hopelessness is the only thing that makes the wait bearable--the wait for your dream to come true. I. All her parallel lives. Questioned about her past, Marcia Hammond always lied with great creativity and no conscience. Her present life felt like something she'd stolen and had the perfect right to steal. Still, like any...
III. Today is your birthday. "So what are you doing tonight anyway?" Grace asked as they closed the Blue Cat for the day. "Please tell me you have something planned. That you aren't just going home and watching reruns of House." "You know I only watch reruns on the Food Channel." "Then tell me you're doing something more special than that." "I really don't think I could bear anything more special than that." "Let me at least take you out to dinner. I promise I won't tell the...
"Morgen" brachte Lena hervor als sie schlaftrunken durch die große Wohnküche des Ferienhauses in Richtung des "kleinen Badezimmers" torkelte. "Guten Morgen" lächelte Frank, blickte vom Frühstückmachen auf und sah seiner achzehnjährigen Stieftochter nach. Durch den dünnen Stoff ihres Nachthemdchens zeichneten sich ziemlich deutlich Details ihrer Figur ab, die ihn an Sabrina erinnerten. Sabrina war Lenas Mutter, die er vorletzte Woche gehreiratet hatte. Frank hatte lange gedacht, nie wieder eine...
Then. A Rustic Village Does everyone remember their first crush with such clarity? Forgetting his is impossible, and if Greg Bartels were honest with himself, he would acknowledge that Amelia Collins is the standard by which every other woman that he will admire or date is judged, a standard against which he will find all those others lacking. He knew that he was not the only one who fell in love with her in these glory days of high school, and he also knew that he would look nostalgically...
“Hey, Tori!” Justina said, running up the porch steps, her breasts jiggling with every step. “Hi,” I said. She noticed me staring at her boobs and did the unthinkable. She flashed her breasts. I blushed and she winked at me as Mom came towards the door. “Hello Justina,” Mom said. “Hello, Mrs. Ryan,” Justina replied. “You girls are probably hungry, are turkey sandwiches ok with you Justina?” Mom asked. “Yes, thank you,” Justina replied. “Mom, I’m going to show Justina my room,” I told mom. “Ok...
Introduction: Conclusion. Justin was missing a void in his life, then something wonderful happens. For the next six months, Justin was a constant fixture at the gay bar. During that six month time frame, Justin encountered numerous sexual endeavors. He still realized that something special was missing from his life. The sex part was great, but there was an empty void eating away at him. During this time frame, the Gunny had been transfered to Okinawa and a new Gunny had taken his place. Justin...
NOT VERY NICE PEOPLE by Crazy Baron (Sequel to Life Out of Joint) DISCLAIMERS This work is not intended to make profit. It may be distributed to forums where it can be read free of charge, provided that the author gives his explicit permission and that the text is not altered. While it contains copyrighted intellectual property (namely, appearances of fictional characters), no copyright infringement is intended. As the story deals with topics and themes related to...
This is my first try to write an erotic story so the story draft may seem raw. I welcome comments from everybody and you can write to me of what you thought at [email protected] ---------------------------------------------------------------- JUSTINS DECENT by hfernandez1983 ---------------------------------------------------------------- It was a nice summer morning. Justin had just woken up and went straight to the window. He opened it and could feel the fresh breeze of...
SOUTH AFRICAN GANG RAPEBy Shabbadew2002 Contact me at: [email protected] Five white wives were lounging and gossiping at the home of one of them in Polokwane early one Friday afternoon. Four were married to businessmen who made their living as vendors selling to the South African National Defence Force. All of their men that week were away on business. Colonel Binda, commander of the Mechanized Brigade stationed in Polokwane, had been having them watched and decided he wanted the five...
Ellen heard muffled voices somewhere off in the darkness and froze in her tracks. The rutted path upon which she struggled to keep her footing, had no doubt been recently trampled by soldiers on their way to and from the irregular picket-lines, which the tattered remnants of the Georgia Militia had stretched thinly through the woods northwest of Savannah to defend their retreat. The deep grooves impressed into the mud, which made walking so treacherous, were dug by heavy cannon wheels, she...
HistoricalThe snow was getting deeper. I could barely see through the swirling clouds of crystals. My headlights were so attenuated by the blizzard that the road was invisible more often than not. For the tenth time in as many minutes I cursed myself for starting south so late. At best, I could only see about ten feet ahead. As a result I was only moving about twenty miles an hour – and that was reckless, but I needed to get to the lodge soon. Normally, I head south as soon as I get laid off. This year,...
Earlier That Evening Jacob Culverin came out of his house and walked out onto his porch. He stood at the rail and gazed out smiling at what he saw. The house wasn’t even a house any longer, but was more of an estate or manor, and certainly not the one-room cabin it had been when he first arrived twenty years before. He knew that the crazy preacher in Springwater thought Jacob had sold his soul to Satan. If he only knew the truth... Summer 1794 When Jacob had arrived in Springwater, he had...
South of Bikini Season 5 Episode 6 "Devil's Cauldron" 1830hrs, Reilly Research Station, July 8th, 2020BC "So you can't recall what you were thinking before that bottle hit you- and you don't remember transporting up to 720BC Mahram?" Emily was still interrogating our sister when I walked into the infirmary. She was intently examining the back of Allie's head. I had failed to notice the dried blood scabbed back there after I had pulled her free of Bilkis. Emily was...
FRIDAY, March 10 2006 — SOUTH BEACH, MIAMI, FLORIDA "Oh look Mandy," I cried as we turned left off 5th Street onto Ocean Drive and saw the white capped blue waves breaking on the famous beach to our right, while on our left the architectural splendor of the Art Deco district flashed by. I could feel the excitement of Ellie and Crystal behind me as Mandy slowed her red A-6, as engrossed by the passing scenery as the rest of us. "There it is!" Ellie screamed in my ear, her arm pointing...
Freidal had been in front of his troops when they marched into the fort. He saluted Count Quillan, and then stayed on his horse until they were at the quarters area. The men took the wounded to the hospital tents and then collapsed into their own blankets. Freidal waited until the last man was resting before he sought out Xitki. "This isn't working," he told the old man bluntly. Xitki Quillan toyed with a mug of wine and waved him to sit. "The first thing a competent officer learns is...
Two days later, and after a tearful good bye, HMS Medusa put to sea. After four days of clawing up against westerly winds, they reached Plymouth where they were joined by two prison transports. A third transport was not yet ready, waiting for another consignment of convicts from a distant prison. The two other captains insisted on sailing, saying that the prisoners were on board already and had to be fed. Tony pointed out to them that his orders were to escort three transports, but they...
South American AdventureChapter OneThe pub was packed with noisy students laughing, joking and drinking. It was noted for it. After all, it was the closest to one of the main university halls of residence and as such was very popular. Cindy sat alone in a corner, hoping her friend would hurry up and arrive. A quiet, shy girl in her first year at University reading Geography, she did not mix or make friends easily and actually found it quite difficult to be alone in such a lively...
"Missy," I yelled, "where the hell are my clothes? I can't go running around out there killing Redcoats and chasing after Benedict bloody Arnold and your frigging husband, the honorable Justin sodomite H--, in jus' my birthday suit!" "Now, don' get yo'self all riled up," she said, crawling back into the bed after using her chamber pot and adopting a deeper Southern accent. "Old Miss Martha'll be along directly with your clothes, all brushed and so forth, honey lamb, boots shined...
This voyage would no doubt test us as a crew. We would be steaming over seven thousand miles at 14.5 knots, deepwater sailing for most of it. I spent most of my time with Ellen either spelling her at the helm, acting as the radar operator or checking our coordinates at the plotting table. We read and played a lot of cards, too. Sure, I spent some time helping wipe down the mechanical space and helping to clean the ship to give me a chance to talk to the rest of the crew--taking their...
Hey readers, this is my 4th story here in ISS. I am a fair-skinned bisexual male. I usually write erotica partially based on things that happen in real life. Let’s jump into my story. This is a story of a shy South Indian girl with a pretty face, fair skin, big natural Indian boobs, and a juicy bubbly ass. She meets a natural Indian pretty shemale to realize her wildest dreams come true! So the story is being narrated in the South Indian girl’s point of view. Her name is Lavanya or Lavi for...
I was glad to see encouraging responses for my first report on my sex life and am encouraged to write some more. Those who have not read the first part, do read it before you continue because I will not be repeating what I wrote there again. So, here goes! I and Padma had a wonderful morning with Rishi that morning and then went out for a non-veg lunch. Even though I and Padma were both traditionally pure vegetarians, wild sex always demands some meat afterward. So, we had our fill and all...
Hi! I am regular reader of iss since 2010 and believe me i liked the way few stories have been described as if someone is writing a poem on women’s profile, their stats. The way they look, the way one is thinking about her and most interesting was to way describe their love making process. In summary i am great fan of iss and in that the “couples” category. Over all these years; i have gone through hundreds of stories and really gave me courage to write something of my own experience. To...
I was your average city girl. Never been to the south a day of my life nevertheless did I want to go. But I promised my Great aunt I’d come to visit her since I hadn’t seen her in more than 10 years since I was 9. I was the typical 19 year old. In college, studying, lots of tests and more studying. Definitely no time for niggaz. Hadn’t had a date since I was 17 as a matter of fact. I guess the benefit of visiting down South would be the peace and quiet time I would get to relax and get some...
InterracialChapter 4 Now you may think that interracial sex didn’t happen in the deep south especially South Georgia during the 50’s. Well it did, it was just a lot more secret. Another thing is when a white man had sex with a black or mulatto woman not much was said as long as you didn’t marry the woman. Men like JL with 10 or 11 inches would be welcome in a lot of white woman’s bed. Mrs. Grinsted was one example. One more thing about Mrs. Grinsted she was a widow had never been able to conceive so she...
Not as exciting as a huge melee with seventy or so ships all boarding each other, but I thought it was a much better result. Only one ship sunk, and the only casualties would be those sailors on Avenger who had never learned to swim. Breaker and the other nine ships had all surrendered, or hopefully would as soon as Mayor Michael talked to them. I got to report to King Tom and the other commanders that the enemy commander had reached the correct conclusion from Wrong Place’s little...
One thing about riding on many western roads: they're straight, flat, and fast. I had to keep checking my speed as I rode south from Bismarck towards Sturgis and Rapid City, South Dakota. From some test runs, I knew my Harley would easily do a hundred. I used the Wi-Fi at a public library to send one email to Lauren, Kim, Ellen, and Crystal that included a detailed account of my encounters with Shaye the previous night, and a few nights earlier with Brite – including our encounter with...
I had a brainstorm. I informed the crew that I didn't want to spend much time at our home port as the federal marshals and ATF were bound to be looking for a couple of stolen Vulcan 20-mm rotary cannons. We'd made our round-the-world tour. Now it was time to fill in the blanks. I voted for taking another case of 20mm cannon ammunition from stores, flushing the poop tank (black water), taking on a load of diesel and booking for Cuba. We'd liked it last time, even though only half the...
Chapter 1 I know that many college students look forward to spring break all across the country, and head out to resort destinations as soon as their finals are over. But what about those of us who live in those resort areas year round? How do we have fun? Well, that question was answered for me and my friend Amy this past year. My name is Shannon Reid. I'm 14 years old, a girl of course, and I live with my mother over a tourist shop in South Padre Island in Texas. South Padre Island is a...
Less than forty-eight hours later, the whole country seemed to disintegrate. The government's regional commander in the north had rounded up a small number of reactionaries, and had intended, so the official line went, to bring them to trial. The suspects had been shackled and loaded into a truck for transportation south, and eventual questioning. News reports suggested that the truck had encountered problems on the journey, losing braking power as it descended into a valley. The driver and...