I want to stay with you as long as you’ll have me.
This is specifically for you.
If you’re reading this it’s because you’ve taken the time out of your busy day to read other works of mine and have decided to follow my profile.
First of all, I just want to let you know how meaningful that is to me. The fact that you’d read my work and often comment really means a great deal. We may have even shared a few back and forths in the comments section (and if I missed some of yours I’m sorry. I don’t mean to. …
No, really. Kick back and listen while I read my stories to you.
Who doesn’t love a good audiobook?
I know I sure do.
And even when I love to read, there’s just times I can’t get to it. Or I can’t concentrate. Or I just want to pop on something I can fall asleep to.
That’s why I’ve decided to start recording some of my own stories, just for you.
No, I didn’t use any text-to-speech bot, or pay someone to do it. The voice you hear is mine. I do add in some sound effects and music for atmosphere (because I love when audiobooks do that).
The three I’ve prepared for…
I intended on leaving it buried.
Lights dimmed to twilight overhead.
The cabin disappeared into a constellation of attendant call signs.
Just after midnight, the jet engines yawned awake, stretching their wings.
I leaned back into the window seat. Little to see but glowing red batons in a sea of black, I slid the shade shut.
The steward directed the attention of passengers to monitors on seatbacks. Seat belt fastening instructions for anyone who hadn’t been in a motor vehicle since the 60s.
I closed my eyes, wishing for sleep, but knew it wouldn’t come. I never slept on flights. Not well, at least. A man…
For anything new to begin, something must first end.
Coldness reflected off the gray paint in the bedroom.
An empty room, except for a lonely bed.
An empty bed occupied by myself and my thoughts.
Wrapped in white bedding, I hid my head from the void around me. I didn’t want to look. I didn’t want to accept. I didn’t want the life I now lived.
Clouded sunlight from the window above failed to warm the blanket. The open window letting in a Michigan January made sure of that.
Suddenly lost in a very real reality I didn’t know what to do. …
I needed it to be different.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” she asked.
I nodded swiftly, a reflex before my brain could catch up.
If I let myself think, If I let myself sift through memories, my entire body might shut down.
My bare chest pressed against her exposed skin. She lay there, calm, looking at me. My body shook From fear. From excitement. From a bottleneck of emotions, I didn’t fully understand.
A sliver of moonlight sliced in through the lone window above the bed. It caught just enough of her eyes. I looked away. They weren’t the eyes I knew. The…
When someone is gone their love remains.
The sound of oxygen forced from a machine.
Forced through a tube.
Forced into lungs.
My father’s chest inflated, his entire torso rising. Lifting from his bed, as if something from within wanted out. Wanted to be let free. His life. His soul
Click.
His chest slumped down as his lungs decompressed. As his soul rested before another attempt.
Numbers on a screen next to his bed fluctuated. I didn’t understand the numbers, other than they weren’t good.
More sounds. More noises. More beeps and clicks and pumps and chimes. Death was noisy. …
It’s in your head. It’s part of you. Now, how do you get it out?
You know the story so well.
It’s your story. It’s part of you. It helps craft you into who you are. The fire of hell you lived through has forged your mind. It’s changed how you see the world.
Now you want to write about it. Share it. Rip yourself open and bleed out until there’s not a drop left inside.
But you can’t.
The white of your computer screen watches you. Taunts you. The blinking line pointing to the blank page. Your lacking.
You close your eyes, sanding over the point in your life you want to write about…
It’s so much more than sharing time
“…for better or worse, in good times and bad, in sickness and in health, until death do you part?”
Until death do we part.
My eyes never wavered from hers, and yet something behind my pupils, behind my lids, behind my mask, flinched.
My brain had already departed. It hopped from my body, sloshing back down the aisle to the now-closed double-doors. The doors my bride-to-be emerged from. Emerged in her white dress. In her half-veil. The half-veil I’d never seen but had practiced folding up to kiss her. We’d practiced our first kiss. …
Time has a way of changing many things.
In the mirror, all I see is time.
How time has etched around my eyes. How a million laughs and a million tears have forged their own paths along brows and cheeks. How day-old stubble now includes the occasional silver.
I don’t mind the stubble. I wish I didn’t mind the lines. The reflection of time. Time has changed many things. Not just the color of hair or the tightness of skin around eyes. It’s changed the way I think. The way I see into the past.
The way I look into the rearview mirror of life. The way I…
You don’t always know when your last will be. I did.
The jet touched down.
My heart remained in the clouds. A ragged kite fighting my grip. Above, it flew. Thumping. Nervous. Afraid.
Nervous about the extended weekend. Afraid of what might come out of it. What it might signal. An aircraft marshal directed the jet. I closed my eyes, saying a prayer to my heart. To my brain. To my soul. Nerves calmed, allowing me to slowly reel in my emotions. Emotions that fought against the current of time and odds.
A chime, and my eyes fluttered open. People began moving. We began departing the plane.
“Enjoy your time in…
