She approached me with a golden air and thick parchment sealed in a cream envelope. I turned my body half-away, wanting to get back to my party, knowing what this was. And, more importantly, what was expected of me. Mom must have thought me the stupidest person in the world for this to be a surprise, but her face was open and excited, so I guessed she did. Think I was stupid, that was.

“Can I speak to you for a second, Caroline?”

I smoothed the front of my blouse, willing her to read my body language and scatter. “I’m talking to Zaney right now. Maybe in a minute?”

I
sometimes I wish
I'd never heard
a love song so sweet
or read a fairy tale
or wished upon a star
for then I wouldn't
feel these things
and think they might
be true.

II
a halting touch
across my arm
brushes across my mind
reminding me
of the way things were
and how I'd wish they'd be

With one look, one breath, one faltering step
Everything went dark
With one voice, one cry, one moment in time
Everything became nothing
With one word, one touch, one last glance
Everything fell apart

With one prayer, one plea, one desperate hope
We struggle to believe
With one call, one word, one sorrow-filled voice
All hope is broken
With one scream, one moan, one terrorized pain
My heart is rent
With one gasp, one sob, one-hundred hot tears
The night is sleepless

* * *
She pleaded with him to move them both into town. There they would be surrounded by people and so close to other houses. His apartment was even right next to the police station. But Dagmar persisted in saying they stay for the animals. He cited responsibility.

“I’d love to take us both into town,” he said, “but where could we keep ponies and goats at a grocer’s? The chickens we’d get away with. The rest –”

“But we could sleep in town,” protested Dove. “And drive back here twice a day to feed them!”

“That would be cruel, to leave them at night.”

“It’s like a peach, you see," she said. "That’s the privilege of the wicked: I take one bite and get to eat it all.”

Her face was like toast and she swung her burnt legs from the tree, saucily looking at the girl below in the yellow dress. She pelted her wet core down on her head like a magpie. “That’s what a pit looks like.”

“Come on down,” said the blonde, fanning herself, slightly plump. “I’m melting like a chocolate icecream.”

I: Heartbreaks
Lord guard my heart
from me
for many of my heartbreaks
are self-imposed
I'm too temperamental
judgemental
comparing myself
to all whom I see
I form attachments too quickly
pondering love too soon
just to watch
my quick-built castles
fall to dust
I too often view myself
in pure black and white
I too often judge others the same
I'm lost and I'm crying
out for relief
Lord guard my heart
from me

1. …you spend countless hours inventing an Elvish alphabet.
2. …you have an ongoing debate with a friend over whether dragons are irredeemably evil or not. *cough cough*
3. …you’re worried that the FBI might investigate you because you keep Googling things like combat strategy, defenses, fortifications, weaponry, explosives…
4. ...you mutter nonsense syllables to yourself, trying to decide if they sound Elvish or not.
5. …you interview an EMT and one of your questions involves a stabbed character in a subterranean environment.

The first Kaht hunt took place the next morning. There were roughly forty-six of us altogether—King Greythan’s original promise of fifty was somewhat exaggerated, not that any of us were surprised. Thirty-two of us set out, leaving a skeleton outfit behind to watch the orchard camp.

Something I wrote just now for Grammar. :)

~~~~

Gurgling, bubbling, rushing stream
Racing over rocks and me
Slipping under a twister so very
White and liquid foamy.

Head-on collision – oh what shall we do?
We tear away – so very quickly to notice.
Twisting right, then left, and finally straight
Down and – slam! – disturbing once still waters.

It would have surprised some people to discover that the day Walter Blythe died was only the second worst day of young Una Meredith's life. The worst day was when Walter had bid her farewell at the train station and laid a chaste kiss on his young lover's lips that burned still on her skin. As his train had disappeared beyond Ketter's Hill she had shivered and shook with a terrifying premonition as Dog Monday threw himself after the train, howling a dirge, and Shirley Blythe had flung himself after the dog and restrained the sobbing, loyal creature.

~o~O~o~