Nathan Kreamalmyer
The Life and Tragic Death of Patricia Spillsmore
The 23rd of August started out like most 23rds of August for Mrs. Patricia Spillsmore. Patricia woke up around 5:30 in the morning, just as she did most every 23rd of August, and proceeded downstairs to cook her family their traditional 23rd of August breakfast extravaganza. On the way downstairs, Mrs. Spillsmore noticed, from the corner of her right eye, that her pool had collected a very large number of leaves and dead bugs. Patricia decided that once breakfast was ate, her husband ventured off to his pedestrian job selling raffle tickets at any and all geriatric functions, the kids were off to school, and the laundry was washed, dried, folded and put away, she would clean her pool with the large screen she had purchased just a week prior.
Breakfast went over without a hitch.
“Wow Mother!” The children exclaimed.
“Yes Dear, what a great breakfast!!! When I get home from work tonight, I'm going to plow you like a garden!” Her husband, Steven Howard Spillsmore III, said with a mouth full of sausage.
“Alright, Steve, that will be enough. Kids get your things and head to the bus stop. Steve, you best get to work before all your clients keel over dead”, Patricia said and after a rousing laugh she continued, “I've got the laundry to do, so best be on your way!”
With the house to herself, Patricia set to her housewifing duties joyously. After all her chores were completed, around 2:59 PM, Patricia ventured outside to give the pool a much needed goings over with the pool screen. Just as she reached the pool, the story of Patricia Spillsmore took an unfortunate and unforeseen turn.
You see, there were no trees in the Spillsmore’s back yard that were anywhere near the in ground swimming pool. However, as she approached, she noticed that the leaves were stacked at least a foot high off the water.
How could this be, Patricia wondered to herself.
Another startling discovery was made when she noticed that all of the bugs were still alive, and frantically buzzing around in frenzy.
“What the f...” she started to say as she slowly dipped her screen into the pool to remove the first layer of leaves and bugs.
She suddenly gasped as she removed a screen full and noticed that the water was stained red with blood. Immediately, bugs flocked to the revealed pool of blood, and it was covered again. Mrs. Spillsmore dropped the screen and covered her mouth. A musty, raunchy smell leaked out when she moved the leaves and bugs, and she suddenly felt sick. She ran to the side of the patio where she puked all over the yard. She puked so hard her eyes were watering, and her stomach was cramping. She puked so hard she fell to her knees and while she was puking, sounded like Grizzly bears in a fight over a bucket of honey! With each thrust, puke flew out of her mouth as she shook violently from the force of each blow. Finally, after about 10 minutes of straight puking, and 5 minutes of dry heaving, Patricia returned to her feet. As she stood, her neighbor rounded the corner of the 17 feet tall privacy fence which divided their properties.
It was Milda Spencer, the neighborhood friendly. She was like the kid in school who was always up in your business and wouldn't take a hint from anyone that she was hated by all. But Milda had a weird growth on her forehead, and nobody in the neighborhood had the heart to tell her off because of it.
“Howdy Patricia!” Milda greeted, “Do you need some help cleaning out your pool?”
“Umm...no Milda, I'm fine. Why don't you just go home, I'm not feeling well today,” Patricia replied.
“How'd ya get so many dern leaves in that pool? And where the sam blue blazes did all those bugs come from? And what's that God ridiculous smell? And why did you puke up something sick and rotted all over your yard? Why you sick anyways? You were fine yesterday. And why in the f...' Milda went on.
'”MILDA!' Patricia interrupted, “I don't know! Please, just leave me be for awhile! You’re, you're annoying!”
“Oh, well, alright then. I hope you feel better neighbor,” Milda mumbled in a sad tone and walked away like a dog with its tail between its legs.
Patricia slowly made her way back to the pool, picked up the screen net, and prepared herself for round 2.
“This calls for drastic measures.”
Just then Milda enormously smiled and peered over the fence.
“Need some help?” she asked again.
Patricia rolled her eyes and said, “Please go home! Okay? I’m sorry but I don’t need your help!”
Milda cheerfully smiled, uncomfortably chuckled, and disappeared behind the fence. Patricia made her way to the shed in the corner of her back yard and pulled out a gas mask, a pair of full sleeved gloves, and rolled out a 400 horse power sewage pump from inside. She tossed on her safety equipment, threw the huge black tube into the pool, and put the other end of the tube over Milda's fence.
“System engaged”, said Patricia as she switched on the ridiculously high powered sewage pump.
The machine made a noise that shook the entire neighborhood and the disgusting water was shooting all over Milda's back yard. Through the air flew entire raccoons, squirrels, and mice that had been torn to shreds by savage bugs that filled the pool.
Milda heard all the commotion coming from her back yard and looked out through her back sliding glass door.
“Oh goodness!” she exclaimed and threw open her door to try to redirect the hose pumping all her neighbors pool filth into her back yard.
Milda ran for the hose, slipped and fell on the grass as the force of the nasty water ripped off her clothes. She screamed loudly as the water devastated the rest of the neighborhood. Milda caught a ride on a wave of sludge over the next three yards and into a nearby neighbor’s back door where she landed on the lap of a man sitting in his living room.
As she sat perched, naked in his lap, the man's wife rounded the corner from their kitchen with a snack and asked, “Dear me, what’s that terrible smell?”
The woman saw Milda sitting on her husband’s lap unclothed. Milda smiled cheerfully with nasty pool residue in her mouth.
“Hi Maude, how are things?” Milda politely greeted.
Maude dropped her snack on the floor with her mouth wide open in shock. Her facial expression soon turned to anger as she stomped toward her husband, screamed out, “Walter!”, and smacked him in the face.
Meanwhile, back at the Spillsmore residence, Patricia had just finishing pumping her cesspool. She removed her gas mask and said, “That’s that!” Satisfied with her work, she dusted her hands by smacking them together. She let out a whistle as she began to roll the massive sewage pump back into her shed. But her song and dance was interrupted by an eruption of hisses and growls. Creepy noises filled the entire neighborhood beyond the privacy fence that surrounded her.
Mrs. Spillsmore ran in the tool shed and shut the door. She tried to escape the hisses and moans, but they only grew more intense as she huddled in the corner of the small shed. After about an hour of these weird noises going on, Patricia's fear gave way to annoyance and she decided it was time to end the nonsense. Patricia grabbed the shovel from the corner next to her and slowly headed out of her shed's door.
Cautiously Patricia approached the fence, and peering through a knot-hole she found something most unexpected. You see, Mrs. Spillsmore had thought the noises were coming from several different places, and possibly things, but all the sounds were originating from one source. There, standing in the yard beyond the fence, was 2008 Republican vice Presidential nominee Sarah Palin.
Sarah Palin was barbequing moose and drinking Molson, Canada's finest beer. Patricia gasped at the sight of the first woman nominee for a major political party, and this caught Mrs. Palin's attention.
“Oh, well hello there my little Joe Six Pack. Whatcha doin' over there?” Sarah asked.
Patricia did not answer Mrs. Palin's question, evoking a more aggressive assertion this time.
“Well Joe, I hope you aren't cohorting with any known domestic terrorists over there. ‘Cause, golly that just wouldn't be good. I had to take patriotic action on your neighbor over here, old Mr. Vincent Hindergooden, ‘cause he passed a known domestic terrorist in his car on the highway yesterday and, you see, he didn't flip him off. And that's not the kind of person we need living here in America”, Sarah Palin strolled to the fence as she recounted the events from the day before.
Patricia finally answered, “First off, my name is not Joe. Now you best tell me, Mrs. Palin, what you did with Mr. Hindergooden?”
“Tell you what Joe, why don't I just show you what I did with old Mr. Hindergooden?” Sarah said as she shoved a set of moose antlers through the fence between Mrs. Spillsmore and Mr. Hindergooden's yards.
The antlers grazed Patricia's face, cutting it slightly and drawing blood. A scream escaped Patricia's lips as she rolled back away from the fence.
“You see, Joe, my running mate and I are Mavericks. And we are reformers. So, why don't I show you how I reform by REFORMING YOUR FACE?!” Mrs. Palin screamed as she front flipped over the fence and threw the antlers above her head, preparing to strike.
As she brought the full force of the antlers down, Patricia rolled across the lawn. The antlers shattered as they hit the ground next to Mrs. Spillsmore. A sigh of relief escaped Patricia as Mrs. Palin's only weapon laid broken next to her.
“Oh, you little six packer, I wouldn't relax quite yet. I don't mean to toot my own horn, but when I took on corruption in Alaska's Oil companies things got pretty rough. And that's where I learned hand to hand combat, and how to be a maverick”, Sarah said with a wink as Patricia scrambled to her feet.
Just as Patricia had gained her balance, Mrs. Palin smoked her in the eye with a right cross. Patricia landed hard on the ground. Her jaw was shattered and her head was throbbing. Mrs. Spillsmore realized that when she landed on the ground, she had hit the side of her head on the shovel she had brought from the shed.
THE SHOVEL, that’s it! Patricia screamed to herself.
Patricia grasped the shovel firmly and jumped to her feet. Swinging wildly to stave off any incoming attacks from Mrs. Palin, Patricia moved forward. Sarah Palin made some sort of weird growling sound and lunged for Patricia throat. Patricia, knowing Mrs. Palin's reputation as a pit bull, had anticipated this and simple sat back biding her time. With Palin's lunged, Patricia drew back and smashed the shovel across her face, sending Sarah sprawling to the ground. Mrs. Spillsmore quickly moved
forward and pushed the shovel to Palin's throat.
“What's the meaning of all this?” Patricia desperately tried to catch her breath as she questioned Mrs. Palin.
“I'm just doin' my patriotic job. Ya know, defendin' the country from both, uh, you know, foreign and, uh, domestic, um, threats and enemies and all,” Palin answered in her annoying little folksy way.
“Why'd you fill my pool full of blood and dead animals?” Patricia pressed on with the questions.
“Well, ya see Joe, those animals have been known to associate with domestic terrorists. Those animals did not fulfill their patriotic duty. They did not stop the terrorists of the '60s while those criminals today were, ya know, walking the streets and heading to their, uh, jobs and exercising and going about their days like they weren't radicals from 40 years ago. So, again, I had to exercise MY patriotic duty and, ya know, take care of the animals for not taking care of folks like Joe the Plumber and Joe the Housewife. And most of the animals here were socialists as well, and that’s just not what America wants, those, um, socialist animals”, Sarah paused and then continued, “But ya know there Joe, that wasn't blood in your pool. No way, that was a red wine marinade. Ya see, as Governor of the United States only oil producing state, Alaska, we are teaching our children at a very young age to, um, not take the land around us for granted, uh, unless of course you can sell it for, ya know, billions of dollars. So we never let things like road kill or things like that go to waste, because that is pork barrel spending.”
Patricia was trying to sort through the very confusing statement from Mrs. Palin. Sarah took this opportunity to take Patricia by surprise. Palin, rolling her feet towards her chest, kicked the end of the shovel and sent it flying through the air over Patricia's head. Sarah then unhinged her jaw like a snake, rose up, and devoured Mrs. Patricia Spillsmore whole. Sarah Palin swallowed down every inch of Mrs. Spillsmore, with the exception of her shoes, which she spit to the ground because Palin does not have a taste for shoes.
“Saving America from those with obscure associations to known domestic terrorists, one person at a time! That's why they call me the pit bull!” Palin said, followed by a small burp.
Friday, December 11, 2009
Monday, November 30, 2009
Second Place Winner in Creative Non-Fiction Category
Johnathan C. Blunt
Darth Vader versus Fabio: For Dave Barry
It happens to every guy. You’re sitting at home sifting through the crap on television enjoying a night with your wife, girlfriend, Star Wars action figure of Princess Leia (in slave outfit), or significant other. She snuggles close and you may wrap yourselves in a blanket and share a tall mug of mint hot chocolate when she turns to you and asks, “What do you want to watch?”
Now if an action figure just talked to you, you need to seek some help. If not, you are now faced with a choice. You could flip it to Spike TV and watch the phenomenal Patrick Stewart in yet another rerun of Star Trek: The Next Generation, or you can find a charming yet utterly pointless romantic comedy. Now, if you’re like me, you want to see Star Trek. You would like nothing more than to see the Enterprise blow some Romulan ships into space dust. However, your other half is sitting there full well expecting you to find that romantic comedy, or else. You see, “What do you want to watch?” is actually code for, “You better find something I like on this television right now, and it sure as hell isn’t going to be The Matrix Reloaded.”
Women, as a general rule, do not enjoy science fiction. They don’t enjoy travelling to other universes or running from stormtroopers or kicking some alien tail. And, as Dave Barry suggests in his essay, “Beauty and the Beast,” it all goes back to childhood (371). Guys, you remember the elation you had when you got your hands on a new Transformers action figure or a toy lightsaber to beat up your friends with. It was all about the action and the technology. The future was cool and you wanted nothing more than to be there. In fact, I’m going to go so far as to say that you were supposed to be there in that future, and somehow you got transported back to the past where there are no new problems to solve. No damsels to rescue, no planets to save, no aliens to defeat. Girls, on the other hand, had toy dolls with their dreamy prince companions, cars, dollhouses, ovens, mops, brooms, fake food, and other such nonsense. Girls are groomed from the get-go to be grounded in realism which explains their need for verisimilitude versus lasers, aliens, monsters, massive Hollywood explosions, and space ships. You start to see a pattern in development. Already, guys are being conditioned to look to the future as their mode of escape whilst women are encouraged to look to the past or present.
But the pattern isn’t exclusive to childhood toys or movie choices. Next time you’re at your local Wal-Mart, take a walk down the small, poorly stocked book aisle. It’s end to end filled with titles like, “Midnight Passion,” “A Lover’s Kiss,” or “Insert Generic Smut Title Here.” Women are reading Nora Roberts when guys are more inclined to read Robert Heinlein or Richard Matheson. Women are reading about muscle bound, irresistible yet intelligent men they could never find much less have while guys are reading about sexy robot space girls with green skin.
You might think, what’s the difference? Guys and girls both want something they can’t have. But there is a difference. There’s this illusion, this fairy tale ending, that gives women nice warm, fuzzy feelings while guys roll their eyes. The princess is swept away by her prince charming and they live happily ever after. Blech. Guys want conflict, and it doesn’t even have to be resolved. Guys want a problem to solve, and their groomed to put themselves into any situation and say, “What could I have done better?” Take a look at The Empire Strikes Back. Han Solo is frozen in carbonite, Luke finds out the most evil man in the galaxy happens to be his father (and he gets his hand chopped off), and Leia is left with the realization that she’s now in love with a newly formed hunk of rock. Bummer, right? No happy endings there, and that lack of resolution is enough to drive women mad.
And that is because women seek simplicity. They’ve been groomed to seek simplicity from day one going all the way back to their plastic kitchens and bubble gum ironing boards. Up until about thirty or forty years ago, it was expected of women to be simple. They were to cook for the man, clean the house, raise the children, and tend to the mundane tasks that men didn’t want to do. And men don’t want to do those things because they’ve been conditioned to think ahead. Look to the future. This world is man’s world to inherit, so they thought. Today, the world has been turned upside down, and though it may be for the better, we still have strong undercurrents of our past affecting our development. You don’t see too many Barbie dolls with gauss rifles and sonic grenades, and you certainly won’t find a GI Joe wearing an apron including an all-new action mop. It’s not going to happen. We’ve got these roles placed upon us by gender that have been so engrained generation after generation that we’re going to see this sort of thing for many years to come. Girls will seek simplicity. They will look to the past or present as their mode of escape, and guys will look to the future. It’s just a fact of life, and it may cause some minor conflicts on the home front.
So next time you’re faced with the question, “What do you want to watch?” just do what I do. Hand the remote to her and smile.
“Whatever works for you works for me, babe.”
Works Cited
Barry, Dave. “Beauty and the Beast.” The Longman Reader. Ed. Eliza Comodros, John Langman, and Judith Nadell. 9th ed. New York: Longman, 2009. 371. Print.
Darth Vader versus Fabio: For Dave Barry
It happens to every guy. You’re sitting at home sifting through the crap on television enjoying a night with your wife, girlfriend, Star Wars action figure of Princess Leia (in slave outfit), or significant other. She snuggles close and you may wrap yourselves in a blanket and share a tall mug of mint hot chocolate when she turns to you and asks, “What do you want to watch?”
Now if an action figure just talked to you, you need to seek some help. If not, you are now faced with a choice. You could flip it to Spike TV and watch the phenomenal Patrick Stewart in yet another rerun of Star Trek: The Next Generation, or you can find a charming yet utterly pointless romantic comedy. Now, if you’re like me, you want to see Star Trek. You would like nothing more than to see the Enterprise blow some Romulan ships into space dust. However, your other half is sitting there full well expecting you to find that romantic comedy, or else. You see, “What do you want to watch?” is actually code for, “You better find something I like on this television right now, and it sure as hell isn’t going to be The Matrix Reloaded.”
Women, as a general rule, do not enjoy science fiction. They don’t enjoy travelling to other universes or running from stormtroopers or kicking some alien tail. And, as Dave Barry suggests in his essay, “Beauty and the Beast,” it all goes back to childhood (371). Guys, you remember the elation you had when you got your hands on a new Transformers action figure or a toy lightsaber to beat up your friends with. It was all about the action and the technology. The future was cool and you wanted nothing more than to be there. In fact, I’m going to go so far as to say that you were supposed to be there in that future, and somehow you got transported back to the past where there are no new problems to solve. No damsels to rescue, no planets to save, no aliens to defeat. Girls, on the other hand, had toy dolls with their dreamy prince companions, cars, dollhouses, ovens, mops, brooms, fake food, and other such nonsense. Girls are groomed from the get-go to be grounded in realism which explains their need for verisimilitude versus lasers, aliens, monsters, massive Hollywood explosions, and space ships. You start to see a pattern in development. Already, guys are being conditioned to look to the future as their mode of escape whilst women are encouraged to look to the past or present.
But the pattern isn’t exclusive to childhood toys or movie choices. Next time you’re at your local Wal-Mart, take a walk down the small, poorly stocked book aisle. It’s end to end filled with titles like, “Midnight Passion,” “A Lover’s Kiss,” or “Insert Generic Smut Title Here.” Women are reading Nora Roberts when guys are more inclined to read Robert Heinlein or Richard Matheson. Women are reading about muscle bound, irresistible yet intelligent men they could never find much less have while guys are reading about sexy robot space girls with green skin.
You might think, what’s the difference? Guys and girls both want something they can’t have. But there is a difference. There’s this illusion, this fairy tale ending, that gives women nice warm, fuzzy feelings while guys roll their eyes. The princess is swept away by her prince charming and they live happily ever after. Blech. Guys want conflict, and it doesn’t even have to be resolved. Guys want a problem to solve, and their groomed to put themselves into any situation and say, “What could I have done better?” Take a look at The Empire Strikes Back. Han Solo is frozen in carbonite, Luke finds out the most evil man in the galaxy happens to be his father (and he gets his hand chopped off), and Leia is left with the realization that she’s now in love with a newly formed hunk of rock. Bummer, right? No happy endings there, and that lack of resolution is enough to drive women mad.
And that is because women seek simplicity. They’ve been groomed to seek simplicity from day one going all the way back to their plastic kitchens and bubble gum ironing boards. Up until about thirty or forty years ago, it was expected of women to be simple. They were to cook for the man, clean the house, raise the children, and tend to the mundane tasks that men didn’t want to do. And men don’t want to do those things because they’ve been conditioned to think ahead. Look to the future. This world is man’s world to inherit, so they thought. Today, the world has been turned upside down, and though it may be for the better, we still have strong undercurrents of our past affecting our development. You don’t see too many Barbie dolls with gauss rifles and sonic grenades, and you certainly won’t find a GI Joe wearing an apron including an all-new action mop. It’s not going to happen. We’ve got these roles placed upon us by gender that have been so engrained generation after generation that we’re going to see this sort of thing for many years to come. Girls will seek simplicity. They will look to the past or present as their mode of escape, and guys will look to the future. It’s just a fact of life, and it may cause some minor conflicts on the home front.
So next time you’re faced with the question, “What do you want to watch?” just do what I do. Hand the remote to her and smile.
“Whatever works for you works for me, babe.”
Works Cited
Barry, Dave. “Beauty and the Beast.” The Longman Reader. Ed. Eliza Comodros, John Langman, and Judith Nadell. 9th ed. New York: Longman, 2009. 371. Print.
Winners of the Fall 2009 Writing Contest Announced
The English Department is happy to announce the winners of its Fall 2009 Writing Contest. Our judges noted that this year’s decision was the toughest yet. We had over sixty fiction and creative non-fiction entries, and they were all of very high quality.
We would like to thank all those who submitted in this semester’s contest. You should be proud that you made the first step in making your writing count. We hope that you continue to submit to contests in the future.
Fall 2009 Creative Non-Fiction Winners:
1st Place: Edward Smith for “The Happy Road”………………………..........$100
2nd Place: John Blunt for “Darth Vader Versus Fabio: For Dave Barry”……..$50
3rd Place: Bethany Joy Swoboda for “The Deer”………………………...….$25
Honorable Mention: Ryan Theissen’s “Inside of a Barn” and
Melissa McMahon’s “Burning Bras and Losing Hair”
Fall 2009 Fiction Contest Winners:
1st Place: Shawn Sullentrup for “Mr. Jones”………………………………… $100
2nd Place: Brian Farrar for “Willful Drowning”………………………………....$50
3rd Place: Elin Feldmann for “Prophecy”………………………………………$25
Honorable Mention: Nathan Krealmeyer for “The Life and Tragic Death of Patricia Spillsmore” and Fred Davis Jr. for “The Daoist Tale”
If you see these people, please give them a round of applause. They deserve it.
I would also like to thank our judges (Linda Barro, Sue Henderson, Leigh Kolb, and Lissa Rosebrough) and all those who helped promote this contest. You helped make this year’s contest a success.
All contest winners are automatically published in the Spring 2010 edition of the Literary Review, so everyone will get a chance to read the winning entries in April. Please look out for the Spring Poetry Contest next semester. Details: TBA.
Thank you for supporting the written arts!
We would like to thank all those who submitted in this semester’s contest. You should be proud that you made the first step in making your writing count. We hope that you continue to submit to contests in the future.
Fall 2009 Creative Non-Fiction Winners:
1st Place: Edward Smith for “The Happy Road”………………………..........$100
2nd Place: John Blunt for “Darth Vader Versus Fabio: For Dave Barry”……..$50
3rd Place: Bethany Joy Swoboda for “The Deer”………………………...….$25
Honorable Mention: Ryan Theissen’s “Inside of a Barn” and
Melissa McMahon’s “Burning Bras and Losing Hair”
Fall 2009 Fiction Contest Winners:
1st Place: Shawn Sullentrup for “Mr. Jones”………………………………… $100
2nd Place: Brian Farrar for “Willful Drowning”………………………………....$50
3rd Place: Elin Feldmann for “Prophecy”………………………………………$25
Honorable Mention: Nathan Krealmeyer for “The Life and Tragic Death of Patricia Spillsmore” and Fred Davis Jr. for “The Daoist Tale”
If you see these people, please give them a round of applause. They deserve it.
I would also like to thank our judges (Linda Barro, Sue Henderson, Leigh Kolb, and Lissa Rosebrough) and all those who helped promote this contest. You helped make this year’s contest a success.
All contest winners are automatically published in the Spring 2010 edition of the Literary Review, so everyone will get a chance to read the winning entries in April. Please look out for the Spring Poetry Contest next semester. Details: TBA.
Thank you for supporting the written arts!
Thursday, November 12, 2009
The Cornerstone and the Literary Review's November Poem of the Month
Tyler Florence
No Home
How odd to enter a house with no doors,
no fair faces found to flirt over floors,
no shadows seen stretching along stand still walls,
no farewells cried out, nor whispered, nor called.
No windows skinny, caressed sight shudders,
no basements bone bare, stripped sick lovers.
No roots over head or space under stairs,
no delicate brush of soft flowing hair.
Know, nothing is air of a lonely hall.
No home is no house of no building at all.
No Home
How odd to enter a house with no doors,
no fair faces found to flirt over floors,
no shadows seen stretching along stand still walls,
no farewells cried out, nor whispered, nor called.
No windows skinny, caressed sight shudders,
no basements bone bare, stripped sick lovers.
No roots over head or space under stairs,
no delicate brush of soft flowing hair.
Know, nothing is air of a lonely hall.
No home is no house of no building at all.
Thursday, October 29, 2009
New Creative Non-Fiction
A version of this essay can be found in the Spring 2009 edition of the Literary Review.
Randolph Watson
Drop the Potato and Let the Little Boy Go
Grandpa’s in the living room watching Stalag 17 again. Grandma’s sitting hunched over staring at nothing. I used to love visiting her. Now it seems like she is giving up on life.
“I called your Mom yesterday. Did she tell you she’s getting married in three weeks?”
“I’m not surprised. She’s the type who needs a warm body.”
I notice that since she’s lost her eyesight her expression doesn’t change much. “I hope someday you can be friends.”
I don’t laugh, even though I want to. “Not likely.”
“I know she’s made some mistakes. Do you think you can ever forgive her?”
“ I look at her the same way an employer would look at a shitty employee. After you screw up enough, the boss has to let you go.”
“I can still hope.”
I love my Grandma so much that I feel like I’m letting her down by not granting her request. That’s asking me to swallow twenty-something years of uncomfortable situations.
In Grandma’s newfound stupor, she has taken to not speaking unless spoken to. It gives me a chance to reflect on good old Mom.
I’m four again. I’m the sheepish little boy with red hair and He-Man shirt. Mom has dropped me off at school; it’s located inside a local church that’s still in town.
I sit down at the cafeteria table alone. The dark blue plastic chairs are freezing. I try to choke down a rice cake.
Class begins. I color outside the lines with a fat crayon. I listen to a Berenstein Bears reading.
Lunchtime. I don’t recall what the main course was, but they had fried potatoes as a side. I didn’t eat them because they looked like a mushy blob. One by one the kids get done with their food and get ready to go back to class. Mrs. Belcher looked at me as I stood up.
“Where are you going young man?”
I’m silent. Nobody at school ever talks to me.
“You’re not finished. Sit down and eat your potatoes.”
I sit back down and eat a spoonful.
“That’s right--keep going.” I know she’s looking down on me, but I keep my eyes on my sand-colored lunch tray.
I take another bite.“ I don’t wanna eat anymore.”
“I don’t care what you want. You will finish.”
The more I chew, the more I notice the lump in my throat. I’m trying not to cry. The lump keeps getting bigger as I struggle to swallow the food. Tears start to crawl down my face.
“Don’t be such a baby. Do you want me to tell your Mommy how bad you are?”
Through a mouthful of fried potatoes I mutter, “No.”
I didn’t feel the vomit coming, but it was on the floor and I knew it was mine. The
potato-vomit looks like as bad as it did before I ate it.
“You disgusting boy!”
I try to catch my breath between sobs. I’m so embarrassed, but at least the kids have all gone back to class already.
I’m escorted back to class and try not to cry for the rest of the day.
When I get home I’m quiet. Grandma gives me a strange look. “Everything okay sweetie?” I start to cry and tell Mom and Grandma what happened at school. Grandma gets mad. Mom sits there.
The next day Mom took me to school; this time it’s different. She doesn’t drop me off. We walk into Mrs. Belcher’s office and sit. Mrs. Belcher comes in and Mom explains what “he said happened.” Mrs. Belcher looks calm. “That never happened. Randolph, why did you lie to your Mom?”
My heart jumped. I can’t speak because I’m afraid. Why is she lying?
Mom looks from me to Mrs. Belcher apologetically. “I’m so sorry. There must have been some kind of misunderstanding.”
Mrs. Belcher accepts her apology and I’m sent back to class. A short time later I see my Grandma storm past the door with my Mom bumbling behind.
The principal comes to the door and asks my teacher to fetch me and come into the hall. Standing there with four adults, I pull my imaginary shade down so they can’t see me. Grandma is mad again.
“What you did to that baby isn’t right, and you’re lying about it! You didn’t see
how upset he was yesterday! He wouldn’t act like that if nothing happened!” The principal keeps trying to butt into the conversation, but no go. Grandma continues,
“I’ll have this place shut down! I’m taking him out of this school!”
I wonder if she can really do that. I look at my Mom. She has tears in her eyes and her chin is quivering and full of little dimples…it looks like one of Grandpa’s golf balls.
My Grandma puts her hand out to me. I grab it and we leave with Mom following us. I never went back to school there.
I had an admiration for my Grandma after that, but I kept asking myself why Mom hadn’t done it instead. I asked myself why the teacher had lied. Why did she make me eat when I didn’t want to? I had spent what I remember of my first few years believing that people don’t lie. It’s not what a good person does. I was also taught to respect my elders and believe that they had my best interest in mind.
The lesson I learned: people lie. I learned: adults you’re supposed to trust need to earn it; sometimes they don’t deserve it. I learned: the parents you’re born with don’t always look out for their kids like they should…
I still can’t eat any kind of sliced potato.
I snap out of my thoughts and hear Stalag 17 again. William Holden’s voice…as well as disappointment, are things that were synonymous with childhood. I look at my Grandma, remembering the strong person she used to be.
“Do you know that I love you?”
…I’ll miss you when you’re gone.
Randolph Watson
Drop the Potato and Let the Little Boy Go
Grandpa’s in the living room watching Stalag 17 again. Grandma’s sitting hunched over staring at nothing. I used to love visiting her. Now it seems like she is giving up on life.
“I called your Mom yesterday. Did she tell you she’s getting married in three weeks?”
“I’m not surprised. She’s the type who needs a warm body.”
I notice that since she’s lost her eyesight her expression doesn’t change much. “I hope someday you can be friends.”
I don’t laugh, even though I want to. “Not likely.”
“I know she’s made some mistakes. Do you think you can ever forgive her?”
“ I look at her the same way an employer would look at a shitty employee. After you screw up enough, the boss has to let you go.”
“I can still hope.”
I love my Grandma so much that I feel like I’m letting her down by not granting her request. That’s asking me to swallow twenty-something years of uncomfortable situations.
In Grandma’s newfound stupor, she has taken to not speaking unless spoken to. It gives me a chance to reflect on good old Mom.
I’m four again. I’m the sheepish little boy with red hair and He-Man shirt. Mom has dropped me off at school; it’s located inside a local church that’s still in town.
I sit down at the cafeteria table alone. The dark blue plastic chairs are freezing. I try to choke down a rice cake.
Class begins. I color outside the lines with a fat crayon. I listen to a Berenstein Bears reading.
Lunchtime. I don’t recall what the main course was, but they had fried potatoes as a side. I didn’t eat them because they looked like a mushy blob. One by one the kids get done with their food and get ready to go back to class. Mrs. Belcher looked at me as I stood up.
“Where are you going young man?”
I’m silent. Nobody at school ever talks to me.
“You’re not finished. Sit down and eat your potatoes.”
I sit back down and eat a spoonful.
“That’s right--keep going.” I know she’s looking down on me, but I keep my eyes on my sand-colored lunch tray.
I take another bite.“ I don’t wanna eat anymore.”
“I don’t care what you want. You will finish.”
The more I chew, the more I notice the lump in my throat. I’m trying not to cry. The lump keeps getting bigger as I struggle to swallow the food. Tears start to crawl down my face.
“Don’t be such a baby. Do you want me to tell your Mommy how bad you are?”
Through a mouthful of fried potatoes I mutter, “No.”
I didn’t feel the vomit coming, but it was on the floor and I knew it was mine. The
potato-vomit looks like as bad as it did before I ate it.
“You disgusting boy!”
I try to catch my breath between sobs. I’m so embarrassed, but at least the kids have all gone back to class already.
I’m escorted back to class and try not to cry for the rest of the day.
When I get home I’m quiet. Grandma gives me a strange look. “Everything okay sweetie?” I start to cry and tell Mom and Grandma what happened at school. Grandma gets mad. Mom sits there.
The next day Mom took me to school; this time it’s different. She doesn’t drop me off. We walk into Mrs. Belcher’s office and sit. Mrs. Belcher comes in and Mom explains what “he said happened.” Mrs. Belcher looks calm. “That never happened. Randolph, why did you lie to your Mom?”
My heart jumped. I can’t speak because I’m afraid. Why is she lying?
Mom looks from me to Mrs. Belcher apologetically. “I’m so sorry. There must have been some kind of misunderstanding.”
Mrs. Belcher accepts her apology and I’m sent back to class. A short time later I see my Grandma storm past the door with my Mom bumbling behind.
The principal comes to the door and asks my teacher to fetch me and come into the hall. Standing there with four adults, I pull my imaginary shade down so they can’t see me. Grandma is mad again.
“What you did to that baby isn’t right, and you’re lying about it! You didn’t see
how upset he was yesterday! He wouldn’t act like that if nothing happened!” The principal keeps trying to butt into the conversation, but no go. Grandma continues,
“I’ll have this place shut down! I’m taking him out of this school!”
I wonder if she can really do that. I look at my Mom. She has tears in her eyes and her chin is quivering and full of little dimples…it looks like one of Grandpa’s golf balls.
My Grandma puts her hand out to me. I grab it and we leave with Mom following us. I never went back to school there.
I had an admiration for my Grandma after that, but I kept asking myself why Mom hadn’t done it instead. I asked myself why the teacher had lied. Why did she make me eat when I didn’t want to? I had spent what I remember of my first few years believing that people don’t lie. It’s not what a good person does. I was also taught to respect my elders and believe that they had my best interest in mind.
The lesson I learned: people lie. I learned: adults you’re supposed to trust need to earn it; sometimes they don’t deserve it. I learned: the parents you’re born with don’t always look out for their kids like they should…
I still can’t eat any kind of sliced potato.
I snap out of my thoughts and hear Stalag 17 again. William Holden’s voice…as well as disappointment, are things that were synonymous with childhood. I look at my Grandma, remembering the strong person she used to be.
“Do you know that I love you?”
…I’ll miss you when you’re gone.
Thursday, October 1, 2009
Another Fall 2008 Non-Fiction Writing Contest Winner
Kevin Branson's Felonious Resuscitation
Risk is usually assessed by the amount of reward one receives for the level of risk one must take, and usually a desperation risk has an inordinately low reward. But once in a grey moon,” usually” does not win the day and the reward for that desperation risk turns out to be higher than anyone could have imagined, such was the case one chilly autumn evening in 1982.
I was living in South St. Louis at the time and went to a party in Kirkwood. Later in the evening, the party got busted by the cops, and everybody scurried out of there like roaches when the lights come on. In the chaos, I lost tract of my ride and found myself stranded with another friend Kenny, who likewise lived in South St. Louis. It was Saturday around midnight, so we thought we might have a chance to catch a bus a few blocks away at the bus loop. After waiting an hour, we realized there would be no Bi-State hero this evening. We were indeed stranded, left only with our twenty two year old legs, but even more so, our twenty two year old sense of adventure and lack of good common sense.
We decided to check the cars in a nearby auto repair shop for one that might have keys in it. Cautiously we crept between and around the injured vehicles, making absolutely certain we weren’t seen. Bingo! A Nova with the dashboard completely absent, but it started right up. In a loud whisper, I called for my soon to be accomplice to,
“come on”. We didn’t get three blocks when we pulled up to a four way stop sign and there was one of Kirkwood’s finest making a left hand turn from our right to left. As he passed by me, window to window, he gestured to me that my lights weren’t on. I responded with a hand gesture of “o k” and promptly made a right hand turn to the third driveway on the right, where Kenny and I exited the rolling evidence. We ran hastily to a nearby church where we could still see the car but could not be seen ourselves. After ten minutes we concluded the coast was clear, so we slithered back into the car and got the lights, wipers, and heater to work. Still pumped with adrenalin, we decide to head for the eastside as all the bars on the Missouri side were already closed.
A couple of hours later, we were headed back to Missouri and opted to stop by a little greasy spoon named Mr. Mac’s and get some breakfast. Kenny was driving as we were going down Arsenal Street from I-55. The car was dying when we came to stop signs, so Kenny was kind of rolling through the plethora of intersections Arsenal Street offers. When, just as we were approaching our seedy destination, we saw the flashing lights of a police car in our rearview mirror. Kenny proceeded to make the left turn he had already signaled to do, hoping the cop would just keep on going. We would not be so lucky, for it was us he was pulling over. Our hearts fell into our gut with a thud as we contemplated spending the next five years in prison. As the officer strolled somberly toward the driver side window, I felt my freedoms slipping away. “Driver’s license and registration please,” he said deliberately. Kenny replied, “I don’t have my wallet, but I think Kevin does.” I was quite certain that my incarceration was about to begin when the officer asked me to step out of the car. Thoughts of flight filled my head, my heart pounded erratically as my clammy hand reached for the handle. The door seemed to weigh a ton, for it separated me from the safety within and my captor on the other side.
As I reluctantly pried my fear frozen body from the anonymity I once had, my legs too shaky to run, I realized, my name from this point forward, would indelibly be tied to this stolen vehicle.
As I was reaching into my back pocket, all of a sudden this woman came running down California Street from a couple blocks away, screaming at the top of her lungs,” Officer! Officer! My baby can’t breathe.” With the reflexes of a puma, Kenny bolted toward the woman like a man with a mission. Turning back after he had run about a hundred feet or so, Kenny, a paramedic in the Air Force for a few years, waved to the officer who was still standing there a little dumbfounded, to “come on.” As the officer began running at full trot toward the woman and Kenny, I felt my freedoms soak back into my veins. Suddenly I found myself standing there alone next to the stolen vehicle and a cold, empty squad car still running with lights a flashing. I turned my attention to the spacious liberty of the opposite direction and began walking briskly toward my new found freedom. I circled four or five square blocks over the course of the next hour to a perch three or so blocks from Mr. Mac’s, where I could see that the squad car was no longer there, but the Nova was. I sauntered my way to the front door to find Kenny sitting in Mr. Mac’s sipping a cup of deserved coffee wearing a huge glowing smile. When I walked in he gushed, “You are not going to believe what happened.” Stoically, he told me his account of how when he and the officer got there, the baby of twelve to eighteen
months of age had turned blue and was not breathing. He then gave the baby mouth to mouth resuscitation while the officer called for an ambulance. For ten long minutes he had supplied the baby’s lungs with life giving oxygen until relieved by the paramedics. Once relieved he turned to the officer and apologized for leaving his wallet on the kitchen table, but before he could say “kitchen,” the officer interrupted him with a conciliatory pat on the back and that he need not worry about it. Moments latter they walked back to the cars, shook hands, and the officer sped off to another call.
There we were, in too much shock of what had transpired to converse in complete sentences, but we completely understood each other. I enjoyed the delectable flavor of scrambled eggs and freedom while Kenny wolfed down a giant portion of hero’s biscuits and gravy .Truly that was the best breakfast either one of us had ever eaten.
The desperation risk we took was grave. Our excepted freedoms were the stake we gambled with so carelessly. But all of it was necessary for us to arrive at a point in time to save an infant’s life. Yes, sometimes rewards are oblivious to risk.
Risk is usually assessed by the amount of reward one receives for the level of risk one must take, and usually a desperation risk has an inordinately low reward. But once in a grey moon,” usually” does not win the day and the reward for that desperation risk turns out to be higher than anyone could have imagined, such was the case one chilly autumn evening in 1982.
I was living in South St. Louis at the time and went to a party in Kirkwood. Later in the evening, the party got busted by the cops, and everybody scurried out of there like roaches when the lights come on. In the chaos, I lost tract of my ride and found myself stranded with another friend Kenny, who likewise lived in South St. Louis. It was Saturday around midnight, so we thought we might have a chance to catch a bus a few blocks away at the bus loop. After waiting an hour, we realized there would be no Bi-State hero this evening. We were indeed stranded, left only with our twenty two year old legs, but even more so, our twenty two year old sense of adventure and lack of good common sense.
We decided to check the cars in a nearby auto repair shop for one that might have keys in it. Cautiously we crept between and around the injured vehicles, making absolutely certain we weren’t seen. Bingo! A Nova with the dashboard completely absent, but it started right up. In a loud whisper, I called for my soon to be accomplice to,
“come on”. We didn’t get three blocks when we pulled up to a four way stop sign and there was one of Kirkwood’s finest making a left hand turn from our right to left. As he passed by me, window to window, he gestured to me that my lights weren’t on. I responded with a hand gesture of “o k” and promptly made a right hand turn to the third driveway on the right, where Kenny and I exited the rolling evidence. We ran hastily to a nearby church where we could still see the car but could not be seen ourselves. After ten minutes we concluded the coast was clear, so we slithered back into the car and got the lights, wipers, and heater to work. Still pumped with adrenalin, we decide to head for the eastside as all the bars on the Missouri side were already closed.
A couple of hours later, we were headed back to Missouri and opted to stop by a little greasy spoon named Mr. Mac’s and get some breakfast. Kenny was driving as we were going down Arsenal Street from I-55. The car was dying when we came to stop signs, so Kenny was kind of rolling through the plethora of intersections Arsenal Street offers. When, just as we were approaching our seedy destination, we saw the flashing lights of a police car in our rearview mirror. Kenny proceeded to make the left turn he had already signaled to do, hoping the cop would just keep on going. We would not be so lucky, for it was us he was pulling over. Our hearts fell into our gut with a thud as we contemplated spending the next five years in prison. As the officer strolled somberly toward the driver side window, I felt my freedoms slipping away. “Driver’s license and registration please,” he said deliberately. Kenny replied, “I don’t have my wallet, but I think Kevin does.” I was quite certain that my incarceration was about to begin when the officer asked me to step out of the car. Thoughts of flight filled my head, my heart pounded erratically as my clammy hand reached for the handle. The door seemed to weigh a ton, for it separated me from the safety within and my captor on the other side.
As I reluctantly pried my fear frozen body from the anonymity I once had, my legs too shaky to run, I realized, my name from this point forward, would indelibly be tied to this stolen vehicle.
As I was reaching into my back pocket, all of a sudden this woman came running down California Street from a couple blocks away, screaming at the top of her lungs,” Officer! Officer! My baby can’t breathe.” With the reflexes of a puma, Kenny bolted toward the woman like a man with a mission. Turning back after he had run about a hundred feet or so, Kenny, a paramedic in the Air Force for a few years, waved to the officer who was still standing there a little dumbfounded, to “come on.” As the officer began running at full trot toward the woman and Kenny, I felt my freedoms soak back into my veins. Suddenly I found myself standing there alone next to the stolen vehicle and a cold, empty squad car still running with lights a flashing. I turned my attention to the spacious liberty of the opposite direction and began walking briskly toward my new found freedom. I circled four or five square blocks over the course of the next hour to a perch three or so blocks from Mr. Mac’s, where I could see that the squad car was no longer there, but the Nova was. I sauntered my way to the front door to find Kenny sitting in Mr. Mac’s sipping a cup of deserved coffee wearing a huge glowing smile. When I walked in he gushed, “You are not going to believe what happened.” Stoically, he told me his account of how when he and the officer got there, the baby of twelve to eighteen
months of age had turned blue and was not breathing. He then gave the baby mouth to mouth resuscitation while the officer called for an ambulance. For ten long minutes he had supplied the baby’s lungs with life giving oxygen until relieved by the paramedics. Once relieved he turned to the officer and apologized for leaving his wallet on the kitchen table, but before he could say “kitchen,” the officer interrupted him with a conciliatory pat on the back and that he need not worry about it. Moments latter they walked back to the cars, shook hands, and the officer sped off to another call.
There we were, in too much shock of what had transpired to converse in complete sentences, but we completely understood each other. I enjoyed the delectable flavor of scrambled eggs and freedom while Kenny wolfed down a giant portion of hero’s biscuits and gravy .Truly that was the best breakfast either one of us had ever eaten.
The desperation risk we took was grave. Our excepted freedoms were the stake we gambled with so carelessly. But all of it was necessary for us to arrive at a point in time to save an infant’s life. Yes, sometimes rewards are oblivious to risk.
1st Place Winner of ECC English Dept's Fall 2008 Non-Fiction Contest
Jennifer Dixon
Sisters in Crime
Heat drips from the popsicles making our hands sticky with red. We work quickly; finishing the popsicles before the unyielding August sun devours them. My little sister sighs deeply and wipes at her crimson stained mouth with the cuff of her t-shirt.
“I am soooo boooored,” she whines, throwing her head down and snapping her sweaty, blond ponytail forward, cheerleader style.
“Trisha, you are soooooo dramatic,” I mock, while wiping my hands on my faded blue jean shorts.
There are three short days left of our break and boredom hangs in the air like an dark rain cloud. Long days of droning teachers and restrictive desks loom ever near, threatening our summer freedom. The smell of pool chlorine, the chime of the ice cream man’s jingle, and juicy, blue-raspberry sno cones will be replaced. Our days will soon be filled with the odor of #2 pencil shavings, the squeak of chalk on freshly washed blackboards, and the bland cafeteria mush served up by disgruntled, hair-net wearing lunch ladies who sport hairy moles like they are the latest fad.
She glances up at me from where she sits on our concrete steps. Aqua blue eyes, so similar to my own, shoot laser beams of contempt in my direction. I study her face, waiting for her sarcastic reply, and notice her freckles have multiplied exponentially since the start of summer. She opens her mouth, ready to let me have it, and is interrupted by the rusty squeak of our screen door. We turn and see Mom poking her head out.
“Girls, I’m gonna run to the store to pick up a few things. You think you’ll be okay for an hour or so?”
“Yeah, we’ll be fine,” I say, ready to assume the role of boss for the next hour. Trisha nods in approval.
Mom ducks back into the house and returns seconds later with keys and purse in tow. She hurries toward the car, yelling out her last reminders over her shoulder.
“You guys know the rules when I’m gone. No using the stove and don’t answer the door for anyone!”
Trisha and I both nod in false obedience, anxious for a whole hour free from parental guidance. She hops into the family Citation, a dull two-tone maroon, and rolls down the window to release the hot, stuffy air. Before pulling out, she calls out the window.
“Be good girls. I love you.”
We wave as she drives away, feeling the weight of authority lift. Trisha and I lock eyes; sly grins overtake our faces. Our previous altercation now forgotten, my sister and I are now ready for mischief…good old-fashioned mischief. We escape into the air-conditioning of our living room and I lock the door behind us, all alone with ideas of trouble.
“So…whadaya wanna do?” she asks, curious to see what bright idea I’ll come up with this time. I am never short of unique ideas for having fun and Trisha is always willing to go along for the unpredictable ride. Let me think…there was the time we washed the dishes while we took a bath in our swimsuits; two chores for the price of one. The time we put a twelve-pound bowling ball on our trampoline, batting it down and playing a warped game of keep away as we jumped around. Trisha sacrificed two front teeth for that day of twisted fun. And, who could forget, canned food art. We lined up different cans of food in the road and watched, hidden from sight, as cars unknowingly became artists. Our climatic excitement was always satisfied by the impending *POP* as the colorful food burst from its tin prison, then *SPLAT* as it sprayed in a thick, abstract pattern over the black asphalt canvas.
“Well, we can’t use the stove. We can’t go outside,” I rattle things off trying to find inspiration on the trail of “cant’s.” Trisha, startled by her own strike of genius, throws her arms up in an “A-ha” moment.
“We can’t use the stove, right? But, Mom didn’t say ANYTHING about the microwave!” Her red stained lips break into a maniacal smile, and with her cheeks still rosy from the heat, she takes on the appearance of a lunatic clown. Her genius in finding this loophole is the catalyst that sparks my best idea yet. I grab Trisha by her chubby wrists and begin ranting.
“Oh my gosh! I just though of something! You know how when Mom bakes and we ask for a taste and we only get like a teeny-tiny teaspoonful. And then she says we can lick the bowl, but scrapes out ever last drop. We could totally make like a whole bowl of icing just to eat. We could have it all to ourselves,” I sputter on, breathlessly, unable to control my excitement. I have spoken words dipped in magic and rolled in glittery fairy dust. I have cast my spell. Her eyes glaze over and her mouth falls open. She is thinking about the delight she will find at the bottom of a bowl filled with sweet, gooey icing.
I tug her arm, coaxing her gently in the direction of the kitchen. I continue filling her in on the details of my perfect plan.
“Okay. So, I’ve seen Mom make icing a million times. There are only like three ingredients.” I begin going through the cabinets searching for what I need. Trisha stands back, unsure what to do. Then, she thinks of something and jumps on our kitchen counter.
I begin to pile ingredients on our slick, wood table top: powdered sugar, butter, vanilla…What are we missing…? Trisha interjects my thought.
“Hey, don’t we need to dye it?” she asks twisting around from her kneeling position on the counter. She is holding the small box of liquid colors we use for Easter eggs.
“Yeah. Pick out whatever color you want.” She nods and slips a small, dunce capped red bottle from the box.
We go to work like pre-teen mad scientists. Powdered sugar and mischievous giggles fill the air in our tiny kitchen. All is going well until we dump in a whole stick of melted butter and several generous squirts of the red dye. We stir until our arms grow tired, but something isn’t right.
“It doesn’t look right,” my worried accomplice says, disappointed. I have to agree. The bowl is filled with a thin, goopy, lumpy mess of pink. Foamy bubbles have gathered on top from our vigorous stirring.
“Well, we haven’t used the mixer yet. Once we blend everything together it will be perfect,” I coax, unwilling to admit that our Pepto-Bismol concoction would not hold up to icing a Twinkie. She grabs the mixer and plops it in the bowl. Then, disaster ensues.
As soon as she flips the switch the bowl goes into a schizophrenic rage. It twists and turns, leaving the wallpapered kitchen dripping pink like bulimic Barbie threw up her cotton candy binge.
“TURN IT OFF….TURN IT OFF!” I scream at the top of my lungs. Trisha pushes a button and the room falls silent. We meet eyes and share a moment of trepidation. We both know we will be dead once our Mom walks through the door. I’m not sure how she will carry it out, but I will not live to see junior high, kiss a boy, or drive. Trisha will not live to know what it is like to wake up with a dry bed in the morning and her Luke Perry poster will go unkissed forevermore.
“Okay…I think we have time to clean this up,” I say, panicked. Death is looming near, driving the speed limit in a two-tone Citation.
“Trish, we have time.” Her blue eyes are watering, bottom lip shaking. Her purple track shirt is splattered with icing. I run to the sink and grab a wash rag and throw it in her direction.
“Start cleaning!” We go to scrubbing like two janitors who get paid serious dough for a living. I’ve never worked so hard or fast in my life.
“We’re gonna get away with this, Trish,” I beam in her direction. Her face is red and shiny with sweat.
“Why do we always do…” She is interrupted by our squeaky screen door.
“Girls, you need to come help me bring some stuff in,” Mom’s voice breaks my confidence. I glance around and am semi-satisfied with our clean up, but the bowl of icing still sits on the ….
“Girls did you…” She stops in the doorway. We are caught, pink-handed, holding sponges and the best evidence of all, the goop filled bowl screams from the middle of our table. She scans the room, her eyes smoking with fury. Most of the walls are clean now, but a few streaks of incrimination remain. She takes in a huge breath to gather her Mom wits and probably to contemplate the best way to get rid of two small bodies. Trisha and I remain still, trying to appreciate what remains of our lives. I’m sure gonna miss my family, especially Trisha. I glance in her direction and my Mom’s anger grabs my attention.
“What were you girls…You know what, never mind. I don’t know what little pink potion you guys created, but you’re gonna eat every last drop. Your Dad and I work too hard to be wasting food. I hope it tastes better than it looks,” she makes her way over to our utensil drawer and scoops out… two… spoons...whew—not a knife. She slings them on the table. The metallic clatter makes my stomach roll. Trisha and I remain as silent and still as GI Joe soldiers.
“I’m going to bring groceries in and you guys are gonna have your pink dinner and then you’re gonna finish cleaning up this kitchen. Bon appétit,” she smiles satisfied with her wicked punishment. She whips around and stalks out the kitchen door. We do not move or speak until we hear the slam of the screen door.
“Well, I guess it’s time to eat,” I try to make a joke.
“She was real mad,” Trisha says. We sit down across from each other and grab our tarnished, silver spoons. We hear the screen open again, and Mom floats through the kitchen. She is obviously pleased with the Mom justice she has smacked down. She begins unpacking the groceries onto the counter.
“Eat up, girls! Your dinner’s getting cold,” she punctuates her statement with a Cheshire grin, and sidles back out of the room.
“How bad can it be? It’s just powdered sugar, butter, and red dye,” I say, anxious to get this over with. I delicately dip my spoon in the bowl to get a tiny taste. I know, if I go first Trisha is more likely to follow and we can get over this pink hump. I poke my tongue out and close my eyes. The cold glop meets my taste buds and I realize this might not be so bad. Mom thought she was giving us a tough punishment, but this tastes like liquid cotton candy.
“Mmmmm…it’s not too bad,” I let Trisha know it is safe to dive in to the lagoon. She goes for it and the sick face she is wearing dissipates and is replaced by a smile of relief. We alternate dipping, then licking our spoons. My Mom quietly continues to put away the groceries and, eventually, leaves us by ourselves.
After 203 dips, and 202 licks we begin to understand the downside. I am getting nauseous and Trisha is turning a color that could only be named on a crayon. Maybe ‘I’m Gonna Puke’ green. The sound of it makes my ears smile.
It is at this moment, watching Trisha dutifully choke down her portion of this disaster, that I understand; we are in this thing together. The earliest memory I can recall involves her; the day my parents brought her home from the hospital. And from then on out, we have been sharing baths, secrets, and spankings. There is no one else on this planet that laughs at my corny jokes or willingly carries out my stupid schemes like she does. We tend to get ourselves in some messy situations, but we always come out laughing with another shared disaster under our high tops. I am thoughtfully staring at my green hued partner in…No, sister in crime when Mom pokes her head in and tells us we can stop eating.
“You girls need to finish cleaning these walls before your Dad gets home.”
“Okay,” we say in thankful unison. I gladly pick up the bowl and carry the remainder of the sweet nastiness to our sink. I wet a sponge and toss it in Trisha’s direction. She goes to work cleaning the remainder of our gaffe and I begin washing the bowl when I hear my sister speak words dipped in magic and rolled in glittery fairy dust:
“So, what do ya wanna do tomorrow?”
Sisters in Crime
Heat drips from the popsicles making our hands sticky with red. We work quickly; finishing the popsicles before the unyielding August sun devours them. My little sister sighs deeply and wipes at her crimson stained mouth with the cuff of her t-shirt.
“I am soooo boooored,” she whines, throwing her head down and snapping her sweaty, blond ponytail forward, cheerleader style.
“Trisha, you are soooooo dramatic,” I mock, while wiping my hands on my faded blue jean shorts.
There are three short days left of our break and boredom hangs in the air like an dark rain cloud. Long days of droning teachers and restrictive desks loom ever near, threatening our summer freedom. The smell of pool chlorine, the chime of the ice cream man’s jingle, and juicy, blue-raspberry sno cones will be replaced. Our days will soon be filled with the odor of #2 pencil shavings, the squeak of chalk on freshly washed blackboards, and the bland cafeteria mush served up by disgruntled, hair-net wearing lunch ladies who sport hairy moles like they are the latest fad.
She glances up at me from where she sits on our concrete steps. Aqua blue eyes, so similar to my own, shoot laser beams of contempt in my direction. I study her face, waiting for her sarcastic reply, and notice her freckles have multiplied exponentially since the start of summer. She opens her mouth, ready to let me have it, and is interrupted by the rusty squeak of our screen door. We turn and see Mom poking her head out.
“Girls, I’m gonna run to the store to pick up a few things. You think you’ll be okay for an hour or so?”
“Yeah, we’ll be fine,” I say, ready to assume the role of boss for the next hour. Trisha nods in approval.
Mom ducks back into the house and returns seconds later with keys and purse in tow. She hurries toward the car, yelling out her last reminders over her shoulder.
“You guys know the rules when I’m gone. No using the stove and don’t answer the door for anyone!”
Trisha and I both nod in false obedience, anxious for a whole hour free from parental guidance. She hops into the family Citation, a dull two-tone maroon, and rolls down the window to release the hot, stuffy air. Before pulling out, she calls out the window.
“Be good girls. I love you.”
We wave as she drives away, feeling the weight of authority lift. Trisha and I lock eyes; sly grins overtake our faces. Our previous altercation now forgotten, my sister and I are now ready for mischief…good old-fashioned mischief. We escape into the air-conditioning of our living room and I lock the door behind us, all alone with ideas of trouble.
“So…whadaya wanna do?” she asks, curious to see what bright idea I’ll come up with this time. I am never short of unique ideas for having fun and Trisha is always willing to go along for the unpredictable ride. Let me think…there was the time we washed the dishes while we took a bath in our swimsuits; two chores for the price of one. The time we put a twelve-pound bowling ball on our trampoline, batting it down and playing a warped game of keep away as we jumped around. Trisha sacrificed two front teeth for that day of twisted fun. And, who could forget, canned food art. We lined up different cans of food in the road and watched, hidden from sight, as cars unknowingly became artists. Our climatic excitement was always satisfied by the impending *POP* as the colorful food burst from its tin prison, then *SPLAT* as it sprayed in a thick, abstract pattern over the black asphalt canvas.
“Well, we can’t use the stove. We can’t go outside,” I rattle things off trying to find inspiration on the trail of “cant’s.” Trisha, startled by her own strike of genius, throws her arms up in an “A-ha” moment.
“We can’t use the stove, right? But, Mom didn’t say ANYTHING about the microwave!” Her red stained lips break into a maniacal smile, and with her cheeks still rosy from the heat, she takes on the appearance of a lunatic clown. Her genius in finding this loophole is the catalyst that sparks my best idea yet. I grab Trisha by her chubby wrists and begin ranting.
“Oh my gosh! I just though of something! You know how when Mom bakes and we ask for a taste and we only get like a teeny-tiny teaspoonful. And then she says we can lick the bowl, but scrapes out ever last drop. We could totally make like a whole bowl of icing just to eat. We could have it all to ourselves,” I sputter on, breathlessly, unable to control my excitement. I have spoken words dipped in magic and rolled in glittery fairy dust. I have cast my spell. Her eyes glaze over and her mouth falls open. She is thinking about the delight she will find at the bottom of a bowl filled with sweet, gooey icing.
I tug her arm, coaxing her gently in the direction of the kitchen. I continue filling her in on the details of my perfect plan.
“Okay. So, I’ve seen Mom make icing a million times. There are only like three ingredients.” I begin going through the cabinets searching for what I need. Trisha stands back, unsure what to do. Then, she thinks of something and jumps on our kitchen counter.
I begin to pile ingredients on our slick, wood table top: powdered sugar, butter, vanilla…What are we missing…? Trisha interjects my thought.
“Hey, don’t we need to dye it?” she asks twisting around from her kneeling position on the counter. She is holding the small box of liquid colors we use for Easter eggs.
“Yeah. Pick out whatever color you want.” She nods and slips a small, dunce capped red bottle from the box.
We go to work like pre-teen mad scientists. Powdered sugar and mischievous giggles fill the air in our tiny kitchen. All is going well until we dump in a whole stick of melted butter and several generous squirts of the red dye. We stir until our arms grow tired, but something isn’t right.
“It doesn’t look right,” my worried accomplice says, disappointed. I have to agree. The bowl is filled with a thin, goopy, lumpy mess of pink. Foamy bubbles have gathered on top from our vigorous stirring.
“Well, we haven’t used the mixer yet. Once we blend everything together it will be perfect,” I coax, unwilling to admit that our Pepto-Bismol concoction would not hold up to icing a Twinkie. She grabs the mixer and plops it in the bowl. Then, disaster ensues.
As soon as she flips the switch the bowl goes into a schizophrenic rage. It twists and turns, leaving the wallpapered kitchen dripping pink like bulimic Barbie threw up her cotton candy binge.
“TURN IT OFF….TURN IT OFF!” I scream at the top of my lungs. Trisha pushes a button and the room falls silent. We meet eyes and share a moment of trepidation. We both know we will be dead once our Mom walks through the door. I’m not sure how she will carry it out, but I will not live to see junior high, kiss a boy, or drive. Trisha will not live to know what it is like to wake up with a dry bed in the morning and her Luke Perry poster will go unkissed forevermore.
“Okay…I think we have time to clean this up,” I say, panicked. Death is looming near, driving the speed limit in a two-tone Citation.
“Trish, we have time.” Her blue eyes are watering, bottom lip shaking. Her purple track shirt is splattered with icing. I run to the sink and grab a wash rag and throw it in her direction.
“Start cleaning!” We go to scrubbing like two janitors who get paid serious dough for a living. I’ve never worked so hard or fast in my life.
“We’re gonna get away with this, Trish,” I beam in her direction. Her face is red and shiny with sweat.
“Why do we always do…” She is interrupted by our squeaky screen door.
“Girls, you need to come help me bring some stuff in,” Mom’s voice breaks my confidence. I glance around and am semi-satisfied with our clean up, but the bowl of icing still sits on the ….
“Girls did you…” She stops in the doorway. We are caught, pink-handed, holding sponges and the best evidence of all, the goop filled bowl screams from the middle of our table. She scans the room, her eyes smoking with fury. Most of the walls are clean now, but a few streaks of incrimination remain. She takes in a huge breath to gather her Mom wits and probably to contemplate the best way to get rid of two small bodies. Trisha and I remain still, trying to appreciate what remains of our lives. I’m sure gonna miss my family, especially Trisha. I glance in her direction and my Mom’s anger grabs my attention.
“What were you girls…You know what, never mind. I don’t know what little pink potion you guys created, but you’re gonna eat every last drop. Your Dad and I work too hard to be wasting food. I hope it tastes better than it looks,” she makes her way over to our utensil drawer and scoops out… two… spoons...whew—not a knife. She slings them on the table. The metallic clatter makes my stomach roll. Trisha and I remain as silent and still as GI Joe soldiers.
“I’m going to bring groceries in and you guys are gonna have your pink dinner and then you’re gonna finish cleaning up this kitchen. Bon appétit,” she smiles satisfied with her wicked punishment. She whips around and stalks out the kitchen door. We do not move or speak until we hear the slam of the screen door.
“Well, I guess it’s time to eat,” I try to make a joke.
“She was real mad,” Trisha says. We sit down across from each other and grab our tarnished, silver spoons. We hear the screen open again, and Mom floats through the kitchen. She is obviously pleased with the Mom justice she has smacked down. She begins unpacking the groceries onto the counter.
“Eat up, girls! Your dinner’s getting cold,” she punctuates her statement with a Cheshire grin, and sidles back out of the room.
“How bad can it be? It’s just powdered sugar, butter, and red dye,” I say, anxious to get this over with. I delicately dip my spoon in the bowl to get a tiny taste. I know, if I go first Trisha is more likely to follow and we can get over this pink hump. I poke my tongue out and close my eyes. The cold glop meets my taste buds and I realize this might not be so bad. Mom thought she was giving us a tough punishment, but this tastes like liquid cotton candy.
“Mmmmm…it’s not too bad,” I let Trisha know it is safe to dive in to the lagoon. She goes for it and the sick face she is wearing dissipates and is replaced by a smile of relief. We alternate dipping, then licking our spoons. My Mom quietly continues to put away the groceries and, eventually, leaves us by ourselves.
After 203 dips, and 202 licks we begin to understand the downside. I am getting nauseous and Trisha is turning a color that could only be named on a crayon. Maybe ‘I’m Gonna Puke’ green. The sound of it makes my ears smile.
It is at this moment, watching Trisha dutifully choke down her portion of this disaster, that I understand; we are in this thing together. The earliest memory I can recall involves her; the day my parents brought her home from the hospital. And from then on out, we have been sharing baths, secrets, and spankings. There is no one else on this planet that laughs at my corny jokes or willingly carries out my stupid schemes like she does. We tend to get ourselves in some messy situations, but we always come out laughing with another shared disaster under our high tops. I am thoughtfully staring at my green hued partner in…No, sister in crime when Mom pokes her head in and tells us we can stop eating.
“You girls need to finish cleaning these walls before your Dad gets home.”
“Okay,” we say in thankful unison. I gladly pick up the bowl and carry the remainder of the sweet nastiness to our sink. I wet a sponge and toss it in Trisha’s direction. She goes to work cleaning the remainder of our gaffe and I begin washing the bowl when I hear my sister speak words dipped in magic and rolled in glittery fairy dust:
“So, what do ya wanna do tomorrow?”
Sunday, September 13, 2009
Open Mic on Wednesday, September 16, 2009
The ECC Lit Review is sponsoring its first Open Mic of the 2009-2010 Academic year this Wednesday, September 16 from 12:30-2:00 in the AC Atrium at East Central College in Union, MO.
All students, faculty and staff are welcome to attend and participate in this free event. Please bring your poems, stories, songs or just your friends. For more info contact Josh Stroup at jpstroup@eastcentral.edu.
All students, faculty and staff are welcome to attend and participate in this free event. Please bring your poems, stories, songs or just your friends. For more info contact Josh Stroup at jpstroup@eastcentral.edu.
Monday, May 4, 2009
1st Place Winner of ECC English Dept's Fall 2008 Fiction Contest
Chelsey Hartupee
In Excess of Age
If it were up to me, I’d drink wine from a box and smoke cigarettes hour after endless hour. I would tear off this murky brown, balls hot bear suit covered with more than thirty-two sickeningly sweet flavors and tell all those kids to save mom and dad’s five bucks for good music, save their souls. I’d put on “Young Turks” and put these shitty, faded Nike Terminators through hell trying to keep up with the clumsiness I call dancing. And to finish, I’d grab the old man’s hand and let that same synthesizers-and-Rod Stewart combo do its best to make him and me forget he’s so much closer to dying than I am.
But rent’s due in a week, and that old man is sitting in an avocado plastic chair waiting for my shift to end. His own clumsiness is hindering his ability to flip through coupons as he licks another two fingers to help him grasp “2 for $5 Cheerios!” He piles the essential coupons on his right leg and the unwanted on his left. A small stack of bills is peaking out of his sweater pocket, and when he shifts slightly his pant pockets rattle with more copper than silver. I sit next to him, shoving “Half-price sundae Sundays!” flyers into sticky hands and raking up papers immediately discarded with my bear leg.
I have watched Shaun Cassidy play a Hardy Boy more than I’ve seen girls my age. I’ve eaten cold spaghetti and kept score for Scrabble instead of attending classes. I wear this damn bear suit to afford to fill the cupboards. All this for a man that insisted I be named Rivers and hides my cigarettes and peanuts in his sweater pockets.
“This one’s a good one,” he says as he presses the flimsy coupon straight onto my bear costume eyes.
“You’re right, Maurice. That one’s perfect,” I say in approval.
He smiles, and I am glad to have given him some feeling of satisfaction. He has saved us a whole fifty-cents on a pack of paper towels we already have sitting on the pantry floor. He will remind me of this coupon as we roll past them in the store, and I will be unable to convince him that we don’t need them. “The coupon, the coupon,” he will repeat. “We don’t want to waste it.”
However, it’s perfectly acceptable to tack on a superfluous five dollars (no, four fifty thanks to him) to an already lengthy grocery receipt. That’s at least half an hour of passing out flyers. Half an hour of watching proud parents dispense dollar after dollar to already sugar high kids that make me wish this bear suit was a little more terrifying. Thirty minutes of getting requests and shoving a thumbs-up into the face of every camera.
‘I don’t hate him for this,’ I remind myself as I pull another squirming child onto my lap and set the flyers aside for a hang ten. It’s not his fault I hide in a bear suit.
I don’t even hate him for my name. I despised it when I was younger, but now that I’ve grown I’m sort of glad I’m not another product of eighties soap opera inspired naming. I could actually have the name Trevor or Sean, and not sound like a super cool Indian.
I take another glance through these bear eyes, and watch him stare at the paper towel coupon. He flips it over a couple times between his thick fingers. He holds it close to his eyes and looks at the picture.
“We already have these, Rivers. They’re sittin’ at the bottom of the pantry. I thought all you did was look atcher feet!” he said as he shifted the coupon to his left leg.
It is his disgusting yellowed nails and heroin-addict veins grabbing my hand every time I leave the room that I hate; that grasp burns with backwardness. I hate having to keep clothes shoved into entertainment center drawers and under coffee table tops; sleeping in the living room night after night just so I know if he’s going out the door at 3 AM. That couch I call a bed is scratchy and its bland, oatmeal coloring matches his skin. I sometimes dream that it is his age I am sinking into instead of a lumpy couch.
This was the man who held me up by fingers, shaking me to Stevie Wonder to make my mom forget the stack of unpaid nursing home bills. This forgotten forgetting man still insists on shaving himself even though it leaves him scuffed. The adult sympathy and childish incomprehension that gushes when we enter a room floods all of that away and reduces us to two numbers: twenty-three and eighty-six.
As children run by us with melting cones leaving trails, he smiles. “I remember bringing you here.”
“Yeah, that was a long time ago.”
He scrunches his face trying to make top and bottom meet. “Not so long, you ran like them. With a little less grace, of course,” he says with an airy laugh.
“We’re both clumsy now.”
He nods slowly but still holds a smile. He pulls his cane slightly closer to him, hugging it like a favorite toy. How long has it been since someone has wondered his name? How long since a woman wished she could sit next to him?
“You’ve still got time. That will grow out, all that ineptitude you got from your mother.”
I pull his wristwatch towards me and check that yes, my shift has been over for ten minutes and no, no other employee of Extreme Freeze has come to aware me of this. I rip off the top part of the costume and give Maurice a thump on the shoulder as I shuffle inside, struggling to keep my bear bottoms up.
“You know I can’t keep him waiting!” I yell, tugging on those Nike Terminators. My manager twists his comb-over around the corner, and gives me a shrug as he hands me a trivial pile of tips.
I kneel in front of Maurice and stuff his coupons in separate pockets. He grabs his cane and pushes himself up. I grab two cigarettes, leaving one hanging loosely in my mouth and the other twirling and tapping between my fingers. He tenderly pats my unshaven cheek and pulls the cigarette out of my mouth.
“You know you can’t do that,” he says as he snuffs it beneath his chunky shoes. “I won’t letcha!” finishing with a smiling grimace.
I inhale and nod. He is still Grandpa. That man is still more than sagging skin and a history book. I bear an entire burden yet he manages more care in one simple sentence.
I grab his hand and we begin our trek to the grocery store; Maurice’s cane sucking concrete and my shoes shuffling a clumsy dance beside him.
In Excess of Age
If it were up to me, I’d drink wine from a box and smoke cigarettes hour after endless hour. I would tear off this murky brown, balls hot bear suit covered with more than thirty-two sickeningly sweet flavors and tell all those kids to save mom and dad’s five bucks for good music, save their souls. I’d put on “Young Turks” and put these shitty, faded Nike Terminators through hell trying to keep up with the clumsiness I call dancing. And to finish, I’d grab the old man’s hand and let that same synthesizers-and-Rod Stewart combo do its best to make him and me forget he’s so much closer to dying than I am.
But rent’s due in a week, and that old man is sitting in an avocado plastic chair waiting for my shift to end. His own clumsiness is hindering his ability to flip through coupons as he licks another two fingers to help him grasp “2 for $5 Cheerios!” He piles the essential coupons on his right leg and the unwanted on his left. A small stack of bills is peaking out of his sweater pocket, and when he shifts slightly his pant pockets rattle with more copper than silver. I sit next to him, shoving “Half-price sundae Sundays!” flyers into sticky hands and raking up papers immediately discarded with my bear leg.
I have watched Shaun Cassidy play a Hardy Boy more than I’ve seen girls my age. I’ve eaten cold spaghetti and kept score for Scrabble instead of attending classes. I wear this damn bear suit to afford to fill the cupboards. All this for a man that insisted I be named Rivers and hides my cigarettes and peanuts in his sweater pockets.
“This one’s a good one,” he says as he presses the flimsy coupon straight onto my bear costume eyes.
“You’re right, Maurice. That one’s perfect,” I say in approval.
He smiles, and I am glad to have given him some feeling of satisfaction. He has saved us a whole fifty-cents on a pack of paper towels we already have sitting on the pantry floor. He will remind me of this coupon as we roll past them in the store, and I will be unable to convince him that we don’t need them. “The coupon, the coupon,” he will repeat. “We don’t want to waste it.”
However, it’s perfectly acceptable to tack on a superfluous five dollars (no, four fifty thanks to him) to an already lengthy grocery receipt. That’s at least half an hour of passing out flyers. Half an hour of watching proud parents dispense dollar after dollar to already sugar high kids that make me wish this bear suit was a little more terrifying. Thirty minutes of getting requests and shoving a thumbs-up into the face of every camera.
‘I don’t hate him for this,’ I remind myself as I pull another squirming child onto my lap and set the flyers aside for a hang ten. It’s not his fault I hide in a bear suit.
I don’t even hate him for my name. I despised it when I was younger, but now that I’ve grown I’m sort of glad I’m not another product of eighties soap opera inspired naming. I could actually have the name Trevor or Sean, and not sound like a super cool Indian.
I take another glance through these bear eyes, and watch him stare at the paper towel coupon. He flips it over a couple times between his thick fingers. He holds it close to his eyes and looks at the picture.
“We already have these, Rivers. They’re sittin’ at the bottom of the pantry. I thought all you did was look atcher feet!” he said as he shifted the coupon to his left leg.
It is his disgusting yellowed nails and heroin-addict veins grabbing my hand every time I leave the room that I hate; that grasp burns with backwardness. I hate having to keep clothes shoved into entertainment center drawers and under coffee table tops; sleeping in the living room night after night just so I know if he’s going out the door at 3 AM. That couch I call a bed is scratchy and its bland, oatmeal coloring matches his skin. I sometimes dream that it is his age I am sinking into instead of a lumpy couch.
This was the man who held me up by fingers, shaking me to Stevie Wonder to make my mom forget the stack of unpaid nursing home bills. This forgotten forgetting man still insists on shaving himself even though it leaves him scuffed. The adult sympathy and childish incomprehension that gushes when we enter a room floods all of that away and reduces us to two numbers: twenty-three and eighty-six.
As children run by us with melting cones leaving trails, he smiles. “I remember bringing you here.”
“Yeah, that was a long time ago.”
He scrunches his face trying to make top and bottom meet. “Not so long, you ran like them. With a little less grace, of course,” he says with an airy laugh.
“We’re both clumsy now.”
He nods slowly but still holds a smile. He pulls his cane slightly closer to him, hugging it like a favorite toy. How long has it been since someone has wondered his name? How long since a woman wished she could sit next to him?
“You’ve still got time. That will grow out, all that ineptitude you got from your mother.”
I pull his wristwatch towards me and check that yes, my shift has been over for ten minutes and no, no other employee of Extreme Freeze has come to aware me of this. I rip off the top part of the costume and give Maurice a thump on the shoulder as I shuffle inside, struggling to keep my bear bottoms up.
“You know I can’t keep him waiting!” I yell, tugging on those Nike Terminators. My manager twists his comb-over around the corner, and gives me a shrug as he hands me a trivial pile of tips.
I kneel in front of Maurice and stuff his coupons in separate pockets. He grabs his cane and pushes himself up. I grab two cigarettes, leaving one hanging loosely in my mouth and the other twirling and tapping between my fingers. He tenderly pats my unshaven cheek and pulls the cigarette out of my mouth.
“You know you can’t do that,” he says as he snuffs it beneath his chunky shoes. “I won’t letcha!” finishing with a smiling grimace.
I inhale and nod. He is still Grandpa. That man is still more than sagging skin and a history book. I bear an entire burden yet he manages more care in one simple sentence.
I grab his hand and we begin our trek to the grocery store; Maurice’s cane sucking concrete and my shoes shuffling a clumsy dance beside him.
3rd Place Winner - ECC English Dept.'s Spring Poetry Contest - Brian Farrar
Brian Farrar
Let This Be My Escape
(Inspired by Motion City Soundtrack's "Hello Helicopter")
I see my getaway
so close.
Close enough to taste the liberation
I’m owed.
I feel its violent
wind pushing on my chest,
mocking my wound.
I hear boots
rustling in the sand,
struggling for freedom.
I smell the oil from its engine.
The fuel, we’re fighting for.
Now it’s gone. Fleeing
from the land, as
hope flees my mind.
Helicopter, you fly so far above me I can’t
taste you now. I taste only the foreign dirt
grinding between my teeth,
and blood
bittersweet in my mouth.
Helicopter, now I can’t
feel you. I feel only the ground
under my back, and the bullet
trapped in my chest.
Helicopter, now I can’t
hear you. I can only hear the crackling
of a nearby fire and the sound of guns being shot.
Helicopter, now I can’t
smell you. I only smell flesh burning
as I lay on this battlefield.
Helicopter, now I can’t
see you. I see one final bullet in my gun,
and a choice not to be made lightly.
Let This Be My Escape
(Inspired by Motion City Soundtrack's "Hello Helicopter")
I see my getaway
so close.
Close enough to taste the liberation
I’m owed.
I feel its violent
wind pushing on my chest,
mocking my wound.
I hear boots
rustling in the sand,
struggling for freedom.
I smell the oil from its engine.
The fuel, we’re fighting for.
Now it’s gone. Fleeing
from the land, as
hope flees my mind.
Helicopter, you fly so far above me I can’t
taste you now. I taste only the foreign dirt
grinding between my teeth,
and blood
bittersweet in my mouth.
Helicopter, now I can’t
feel you. I feel only the ground
under my back, and the bullet
trapped in my chest.
Helicopter, now I can’t
hear you. I can only hear the crackling
of a nearby fire and the sound of guns being shot.
Helicopter, now I can’t
smell you. I only smell flesh burning
as I lay on this battlefield.
Helicopter, now I can’t
see you. I see one final bullet in my gun,
and a choice not to be made lightly.
Poem from Spring 2009 Edition of ECC Lit Review
Jennifer Dixon
Untitled
“I’d like to buy
that bottle of perfume.”
The box with a picture of vanity
with a celebrity attached at the ragged
edges; a maggot in diaphanous clothes.
I don’t care that they paid Brazilian
children two cents and hour
to crush peonies between
their bleeding, calloused
fingers and charge
me fifty dollars
an ounce…
I want
to smell
like
a
star.
“And how you will pay
today? Cash, check or charge?”
Untitled
“I’d like to buy
that bottle of perfume.”
The box with a picture of vanity
with a celebrity attached at the ragged
edges; a maggot in diaphanous clothes.
I don’t care that they paid Brazilian
children two cents and hour
to crush peonies between
their bleeding, calloused
fingers and charge
me fifty dollars
an ounce…
I want
to smell
like
a
star.
“And how you will pay
today? Cash, check or charge?”
Spring 2009 ECC Literary Review Contents
Ashley Adkison
Heave Ho (poem)
Confession (poem)
Amanda Aichholz
Subtle Appreciation (poem)
Kevin Branson
Felonious Resuscitation (non-fiction)
Jennifer Dixon
Sisters in Crime (fiction)
Untitled (poem)
Scars (fiction)
Brian Farrar
This is Punk (non-fiction)
Freedom (non-fiction)
Let This Be My Escape (poem)
Chelsey Hartupee
In Excess of Age (fiction)
William Hawkins
Hope, Follow Winter (fiction)
Thomas Modglin
Senseless Scentless Sentences pt. 1 (poem)
Darla Nordeck
Dad’s Guitar (poem)
Kim Pierce
If You Put Lipstick on a Pig, Is It Still a Pig? (non-fiction)
Christine Pennington
Ode to a Notebook (poem)
Gina Petzold
You Don’t Have To Tell Them, They Already Know (poem)
Shawn Sullentrup
The Porch Swing
The Vacation
Elizabeth Teague
Give the Devil His Due (fiction)
Danita Wilson
The Glass (poem)
Steven Wise
The Modern Knight (non-fiction)
Welcome to the ECC Literary Review Blog!
Hello fellow readers and writers,
This blog was created for those who read and submit to East Central College's Literary Review. The Literary Review is created by the students of ECC's main (Union, MO) and satellite campuses (Rolla, Washington, Warrenton, and Sullivan). We accept poetry, fiction, and non-fiction submissions in the Fall and Spring semesters. Submission guidelines: TBA. The Lit. Review is an annual publication, published in the Spring.
The Spring 2009 issue of the ECC Literary Review is out now! New issues are only $4 and are available for purchase from Josh Stroup, English Instructor and Lit Review, faculty advisor in AC 153 or email, jpstroup@eastcentral.edu for more information.
This blog was created for those who read and submit to East Central College's Literary Review. The Literary Review is created by the students of ECC's main (Union, MO) and satellite campuses (Rolla, Washington, Warrenton, and Sullivan). We accept poetry, fiction, and non-fiction submissions in the Fall and Spring semesters. Submission guidelines: TBA. The Lit. Review is an annual publication, published in the Spring.
The Spring 2009 issue of the ECC Literary Review is out now! New issues are only $4 and are available for purchase from Josh Stroup, English Instructor and Lit Review, faculty advisor in AC 153 or email, jpstroup@eastcentral.edu for more information.
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