This post is written for Emilia’s Picture It and Write Challenge. 
He could here the sirens. The police sirens. The police that were after him. The neighbor had called the police after hearing the gunfire. She was dead. He had made sure of that.
The night hides the crime
Passion gone bad rules again
Darkness my old friend
Written in response to Ermilia’s picture it & write challenge.
I considered my choices.
The South was a terrible place for a young black man. I once lost my childhood friend because his father did not want us to play together. I remember a trip with my teacher when we were ordered by the driver to stand so white passengers could sit down.
I could stay here and continue singing in my little church and hope things would change. I liked singing and music. I would be comfortable life with my mother, who was an accomplished organist and choir leader.
But I saw my father’s proud protests in relation to segregation and I was proud of him. I wanted to make him proud of me so I decided to obtain the best education I could. My father supported me in my decision.
Today I enrolled in college majoring in sociology. After that I plan enrolling in Seminary school.
I hope I have made the right choice.
Written for Emilia and the Picture It & Write challenge.
Original image on Tumblr.
Red was always her favorite color. He had spent the past twenty years of their marriage buying her something red for her birthday. The monstrous hat. The “Flapper” dress she wore only once. Even her nickname!
Her energy and passion always amazed him. There were two sides of her. The one filled with confidence and the other darker angry one.
It was an even fight among her personalities. Until the diagnosis. The angry side became dominate to an almost unbearable extent so that she became a person to avoid.
On one of their last days together they spent on a bench and watched the falls leaves tumble towards their death. Her face pale, her body decimated, her mind a swirling mass of confusion and frustration she submitted to her stalker.
“Bury me in red,” she laughingly told her husband.
This post is written in response to Ermilia and the Picture It & Write Challenge.
“Sir, the third ring has been returned.”
“Has her body been disposed of in a dignified manner Abdu?”
“It has Sir, and her remains will never be found I assure you.”
“You can leave me now.”
As he gazed at the third ring, resting beside the previously returned rings, he thought his revenge was almost complete. The thief, his most trusted servant, had succeeded in stealing the set of four rings. The rings he had commissioned with the finest jeweler he could find. He had spent almost four million dollars on those rings. After he was satisfied with their beauty, and that no other rings would ever be produced that would equal them in pure beauty, he ordered the death of the jeweler.
His thief, once his protector, had been found quickly and beheaded; but not before he had disposed of the rings that was for him a handsome profit. The following two years had been spent tracking down the four recipients of those stolen precious rings.
The first ring was recovered in Montreal. The body was found stabbed and with a finger missing from its right hand. The second ring had belonged to a South Miami sociality whose organized crime boyfriend had paid a handsome to impress the bimbo. And the most recent victim was fished out of the Nile, again without a ring finger.
Now it was time to recover the fourth and final ring to reestablish his collection. He knew who possessed the final ring.
“Abdu, please prepare my Lear. We are going to pay my sister a visit.”
He had planned it in excruciating detail. A walk to reconcile their differences. Her fall would be exactly 430 feet to the rocks that lined the beach below the cliff. Arms outstretched he begged for a hug. Turning her arms to the left was easy and a heavy push was all it took. He knew the currents would take her out to sea. He would be long gone by then.
He started humming….”Good-Bye Mary Ann, Good-Bye Mary Ann, hope you find the love you’re looking for.”
In response to Ermilia and the picture & write challenge.
I received a letter from my shadow which read: “You know you are nothing without me. Your entire existence depends upon me. When you don’t see me you are nothing.”
I no longer see my shadow. Not a single being has a shadow. We wander. The moon is large. The light is bright and we should be able to see our shadow. We don’t.
We form a single line marching to I know not where. People fall into complete darkness at the end of this line. My turn is coming. The darkness envelopes me. I look for my shadow one last time. I am nothing.
In response to Ermilia’s Picture It & Write Challenge.
I work in the Bulyanluhu Gold Mine here in Zanzibar. I should be more specific. I work UNDERGROUND in this dark and damp place. Most of my day is spent dreaming about the world 500 feet above me. This time of year I never see the sun.
Beautiful Lake Victoria is but a few miles away. I dream of it also. I dream of many things. Sports, my favorite rum drink, and of course girls.
Every night, and it is dark when I finish work, I stop by “Paje” my favorite bar. There my fantasies begin. Hajira is her name. She knows me, but not by name. She calls me the “dark one.”
Tonight I bring her a present. It is know by our town people as “the lipstick” fruit. She takes the fruit as she dances in front of me. She turns and struts away and throws the fruit to another customer. Such is my life.
In response to Ermilia’s Picture It & Write.
Things had not been going well for the Holden family. Willie had been terminated from his job working for the New York Central Railroad after 15 years with the company. “Downsizing” was the term the human resource person had told him. Fifteen years down the drain in one 30 minute sit down with the company representative. His wife Margie had been cleaning homes in the neighborhood to make ends meet for the family. Their son Donald was four years old and required special medical treatment for a very rare bone disease. A disease that Willie never understood.
Willie and Margie had both agreed that they would be better off out west. Arizona had been recommended by their son’s doctor. Since neither had any immediate family they could make decisions by themselves without affecting anyone. Together they managed to get everything they owned in Willie’s old ’54 dodge.
They were on Route 66, just leaving Flagstaff when the dust storm hit. Margie saw a sign that read next rest area 110 miles and suggested they stop. Willie, wanting to make good time, ignored her and continued on west.
This post is in response to Ermilia and her Picture It & Write prompt.
The moon rose blood-red
What began in tragedy
Ended in triumph
The fires devastated the world
From the cooling waters a new living thing emerged
This post is in response to Ermilia and her Picture It & Write Prompt.
Somewhere along the road, at exactly what hour into the road trip I’m not sure, I began to realize how little I needed him in my life. It was fun for the first few months but then things began to go terribly wrong. What I thought was a loving and caring man turned into a monster who demanded everything from me and giving nothing in return. We agreed to a vacation in the mountains to work out our differences.
Halfway to our destination he decided that the run down motel on this lonely road would do for our purposes. After checking in we went to our room and he slammed the door. That was the beginning of my hell. The last thing I remembered was being slammed into the wall with such force that I passed out.
Waking up this morning, without him, suddenly filled me with a sense of a new beginning in my life. Raising myself to the window ledge I vowed never again. This too shall pass. From now on it will be one day at a time.
