I sat in my car in the parking lot of the post office staring at the envelope. The return address read “Heaven”and nothing else. I held the envelope up to the light but saw no clue as to what might be inside. I finally tore it open, only to find nothing more than a newspaper clipping. No letter, not even a note. I needed glasses to read the small print, so I fished them out of my purse. The clipping was an obituary.
Over the years, whenever one of my sons or grandsons tried to impress me with how tough he was, I would tell them a story about one man’s heroic fights to the death during World War II, a time when it seemed as if nothing good could ever happen.
I’m brushing my teeth when I hear the crunch of tyre on gravel. Kyle looks startled when he opens the door.
‘Hi honey,’ he says. He tries to kiss my cheek.
I lean away. ‘You’re late.’
‘Sorry. Got stuck in an operation.’ He locks the door and bends to take off his shoes. ‘How’s bub?’
Not having a paycheck does things to a man’s inner spark. I got slovenly, sluggish, nasty. That’s when Marlene left me. Then I truly had nothing.
My granddaddy was an original. I can picture him now in his liberty coveralls, shiny black shoes, and old felt hat. The grandfather stereotype was probably modeled after him. I will go so far as to say that if you saw another old man dressed similarly you’d say-“Hey isn’t that…” Yep’! You would be reminded of my granddaddy.
The tea tray sat on a mahogany side table in a living room with dark green curtains drawn against a late afternoon sun. My father made polite conversation about my journey, the weather and the usual fluff people talk about when they would rather sit alone. His new wife poured tea.
Conrad Treplet emerged from his mother wielding a tiny bayonet. The bayonet was sharp and the perfect size for a newborn boy. His mother, knowing such tools to be dangerous, ordered the bayonet to be disposed of immediately.
The novel Less than Zero is a harrowing coming-of-age story set in the day-glo world of 1980’s Los Angeles. The book follows Clay, a nineteen year old who has returned home for the holidays from his first semester of college back East. During the course of the novel Clay gradually becomes aware of the emptiness of his former life. At the end of the book he rejects Los Angeles, but not before bearing witness to its heart of darkness.
Not too long ago, in the Valley of Sunshine, a crop duster on his daily wheat-farm run veered twenty miles east from his normal flight path. He saw an old brick cottage house half covered in ivy that sat next to a well. Beside the house was a rose garden shaped like a vortex. As he flew past it appeared to be in motion, whirling with the wind. Yellow roses were in the inner circle and pink roses on the outer. The concentric circles had orange, red orange and flaming red roses. From above, they looked like geoglyphs, or crop circles. He was extremely delighted with his find and called it “The eye of the storm”.
Between gritting his teeth, mopping his forehead, and scratching his upper lip, Manalo Tagumpay clung dearly to the last four thousand pesos to his name. He had been at the Hyatt Casino for the last 12 hours, practically his home for the last decade. The dealer, so cool and in control, dealt him a card – an ace of spade to add to his four of diamonds and contemplated on his next move. His name’s literal translation is ‘to win’ and ‘success”, but that did not seem to be his case.