Lightning

By Edele Winnie

The thunder woke him. House shaking, teeth jarring thunder- sounding like an angry god right over top of their little house. He rolled over to see if Deanna had been woken as well but she wasn’t there.

He waited but she didn’t return. She’d always been a bit spacey- it was one of the things he liked about her. She wasn’t intellectual- she was emotional. She’d been called ‘slow” but she wasn’t- she just felt things first, before she thought about them.

She wasn’t in the bathroom, or the living room, or the kitchen. Had she gone outside? She liked storms and would often sit on the porch – tasting them, she called it- feeling the thunder, seeing the bright lightening flashes, inhaling the wind. Continue reading →

Bleep Bleep Bleep

Dale opened his eyes, he hated the sound of his alarm clock but then supposed that that was the point. With a slap he silenced the damned thing. It was nearly 7:00am, he had to shit, shower and shave before he headed off to work. Screw it! He would shower after work, shit while at work (might as well get paid for it) and shave sometime next week—it wasn’t like those three hairs on his chin were going to be getting company anytime soon. He would just rest his eyes for five or ten minutes.

“Dale. Dale, honey, don’t you got work today?”

Dale opened his eyes to find his mom standing over him. “What time is it?” Dale asked as he yawned.

“It’s just after eight.”

“What?!” Dale jumped from his bed; his lord of the rings blanket flying to the floor. “I’m late!”

In a matter of minutes Dale had donned his obnoxiously coloured purple and red uniform complete with shiny gold name-tag dangling from the shirt collar, scarfed a cold pop tart, threw on his shoes, snatched the keys to his mom’s minivan and bolted out the door. Continue reading →