{When Anna was visting we went to a writing class at the library. These are my stories from the prompts we did - the first is off of the same words Anna's wonderful story is from. I have another poem to post eventually that I wrote this summer, and hopefully before too long 'Mercy Victorious' (Short version).}

 In a torrential wild storm

The rain came pouring down

It ruined summer’s day

Like a favorite teacher’s frown.

The wind whipped through the grass,

And blew and shook the trees,

As thunder cracked and lighting bolted

Gone was the whisper of the breeze.

Such a scene did the storm create

Children everywhere stopped their play

And gathered by the window side

To stand amazed at this rainy day.

When the lightning dimmed and rain grew light,

The thunder was silent and wind grew calm,

Then through the puddles the children jumped,

Their laughter did seem, for the storm, a balm.

Now the grass is watered and the sun does shine,

And the storm is forgotten as quickly as it came,

But thanksgiving for water does remain,

And rejoicing that days aren’t all the same.

 Prompt:

-          My only defense was to write down every word they said

-          On the following Friday, we packed our bags and planned our escape.

-          The thing she did to the brakes on the Honda.

Story:

My only defense was to write down every word they said. My hand trembled as I considered the power my words had. Someone would suffer for what had happened, and my words would decide if it was they or I.

I shook my head. When I had planned the robbery, I had never considered the possibility it might end this way. We had always succeeded before.  But then, time and money had never been so tight. We had been pressed to move without proper planning. And now… now I was in this cold, dark cell because of it.

The police told me I could go free – maybe – if I told them all that had happened, and if I turned my friends in – if they were my friends anymore.

We had arrived in the city on Thursday night. Over the next few days, we researched, tested, and plotted. On the following Friday, we packed our bags and planned our escape. We broke into the museum Saturday night.

It was then we realized we hadn’t actually deactivated all of the alarms. My fellow robbers left me trapped inside the museum, my pockets full of the ancient artifacts we were going to sell on eBay for millions of dollars. The police arrived before I could return them to their cases. I found myself handcuffed and in the back of a police car before I was aware of what all had passed. And then for the next few days, I sat alone in jail. Cold, abandoned, despairing.

The only way out was to tell the police where my colleagues had gone.  I toyed with my pen. Could I turn them in? They had deserted me. Was it wrong to trade their freedom for mine?

I halted those thoughts. I’m such an horrible man.

But I looked out my window. There was sunshine, a family, and hope. Was a fresh start worth my friends’ freedom?
A fresh start? Was that what I wanted? It would mean obeying the law.
I stared at the pen in my hands, and the empty paper in front of me.

New York. They were going to New York next.

The police had asked me for that information.
The question was clearer in my mind. I didn’t have to deliberate between my friends and myself, but being a law-abiding citizen or a criminal.

I began to write. I wrote all about our latest robbery, and our future plans. There were names, dates, times, and codes. I told the stories of other things we had done to aid our thievery, like the thing she did to the brakes of the Honda so the patrol car drove off of a cliff. I had planned and encouraged almost all of it because of my hunger for money.

I set my pen down and looked over the sheets of paper I had filled. Every part of my being to hate what I had done.

This is the first step of change, I thought. There’s hope, even for me.

My fingers traced a tattoo on the base of my neck. I felt one straight line, and then a line crossing that. I had tattooed that cross there out of mockery. Now I remembered stories I had heard about being saved from sin and evil things we’d done, not because of us, but because of something someone else did. If it was up to me, I could never be saved. But this other was perfect, and someone had told me He’d taken the punishment for what I’d done. I lifted my eyes to the window.  Maybe there was hope after all.