I look in the mirror and I see… me.
The me that always was
The me that should have been
The me that has struggled so long and so hard to simply be.

For so long, I looked and I saw him
The him I tried to be
The him I could never be
The him that was ever destined to simply be a role.

Are we not all players on a celestial stage, seeking our roles?
Few find them.

And yet I… I have been privileged
To know myself
To know who and what I am

To realize that I am an actor

And to know that the role is over.

I'm going to do something here and ask you, the reader, to comment, critique, pick my story apart. I have been writing and rewrting this story since 1991...

The first go took me 6 months and was over 600 pages, hammered out on a old Olivetti manual typewriter, the kind that came with a satchel to carry it around. I had learned to type as a child on my father's old Olivetti manual that came with it's own hard suitcase so hammering on the keyboard was(and still is) second nature.

“Look man, when you said shooting the rapids would be an adventure I kinda thought, you know, a nice sort of civilized outing with trucks and guides and whatnot!”

“Yeah, I kinda figured there’d be some water involved too…” Pete gestured around them. “Think the rafts wills slide down these things?”

Kevin stared off into the distance, fuming as the wind hummed over the dunes.

I had been the apple of my father’s eye, the treasure of his hopes and now it was all ashes. Burned by panic stricken villagers as I stumbled blindly away into the bush, choking on my own blood. Ebola had come to our place and I was glad… glad that the others would no longer ridicule me for not being a man when I knew they were right.

I didn’t know why I was crying, maybe it was grief for myself because I was sure I was dying, maybe it was anger at my parents… not so much at them as at the culture that ensured they could never accept me.

Author’s note:

I was halfway through writing this when something else got in the way. I know its too late for the contest but no worries there, even if I did win I would insist it go to someone else.

With that said I hope you enjoy my tardy little drabble.

Abby

The Crush: School Daze

“Crying in a spacesuit is… ill advised…”

“Fuck you.”

I suppose that was the start of a eulogy, incongruous as it was.

He was right though. At least we weren’t in microgravity so the tears traced a sluggish path down my cheeks and into the collar of my coolsuit instead of becoming little floating globules of nastiness.

The sun burned down upon us, casting every pebble and microcrater into sharp relief as the regolith crunched under our feet. The sky was the black of space, even the stars washed out by the fierce furnace which lit our way.

Note to Readers

In this story I use music as an adjunct to the story, meant to be listened to while reading the relevant passage. I hope you enjoy it and if not I hope it doesn't detract from the story for you.

I figured since this particular universe has come around again I'd repost my own meager efforts.

With Permission from Catherine Linda Michel

This story is posted with the permission of Catherine Linda Michel, the originator of this universe.

That said, anything you don't like is entirely my fault.

Kerry darted across the cold rainy street, huddled in on herself to preserve any dregs of warmth she might have left in her. Hiding herself was so routine she did it with half her attention, slipping silently between dismal little pools of light.

“I…” he trails off into silence.

“Ok, I will but I am going to have to meet you kids there and fly back separately as well.”

I can tell he is beginning to retreat inside himself a little so I gently give him a verbal nudge.

“Why?”

Theo answers for him.

“Watch lists. There’s no way he makes it through security in the US. From Canada, no big deal and he can make it there easier than Mexico these days. His only real issue doing it that way is the Canadian border and I know a few places…”

After our ceremony in the garden we were all emotionally drained. Dad went back into the house and brought out the half empty bottle of bourbon and an unopened one as well. We sat together on the shaded benches under arbors which in springtime would bloom with various flowers and in summer would smell of honeysuckle. Just now nothing was in season to bloom so there was only greenery but it was enough to lend an almost cathedral like atmosphere to the scene.

I didn’t feel good about what I’d done. Strike that. I felt absolutely awful about what I’d done, what Jimmy and coach Morrison had encouraged me to do even when I knew in my soul it was wrong. I‘d damn near killed that poor girl. Her punctured lung and compound fracture were entirely the result of my insanely hard hit, a hit I knew I should have pulled because I saw the kick go clean…

Another musical interlude.....

Halftime was over and we were down by 10. I gave a quick shout out to Karla who relayed it to Geoff. I had a hard time getting the guys to wait, but when they heard the opening strains of the song I’d asked for, they changed somehow. A batch of somewhat dispirited football players turned into a team of… Geee, I don’t know, but definitely something predatory and very nasty. They were stomping in unison and charged onto the field as the bleachers shook beneath the crowd.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-tJYN-eG1zk