The Wine Glass

Scent of wine lingers.

My new glass stained by your lips;

Waiting your return.

Before You

Before,
Silly monkeys went unseen as they swung from every tree.
The great white shark in the bathtub never attacked me.

I didn't know dinosaurs and pirates could be the best of friends,
or a kiss from me would be the thread that helps your owie mend.

I never woke at the crack of dawn, to figure out what was going on,
only to hear your voice ask, "Can I sleep in your bed mom?"

I didn't have to make up answers for such inquisitive questions,
or had to be responsible on the path through life's direction.

You see,
before my world was undiscovered,
and I didn't have a clue.

Unconditional love uncovered.
My life meant nothing,
before there was you!

Where She Could Have Been

He held her tightly. The smell of his cologne brought memories of the cheap stuff she had once bought her father for Christmas. The cologne he only wears on special occasions to disguise the smell of alcohol and cigarette smoke that he will later blame on his buddies; yet the stench always seems to find its way through the larger pores in his forehead. She stood there, frozen in his arms as he looked down into the depths of her brown eyes; passed the hopes and dreams and straight down into what she feared most but was still unfamiliar with. Her blank gaze brought satisfaction to the broken red veins in his eyes, as she tried to remember at what moment Aaron had figured out her family would be on vacation without her.

“One of these days that mouth is gonna get you in a ton of trouble,” her older sister April would always say. “Is this all my fault?” Carly thought to herself as her eyes filled with tears over an overlooked right called freedom.

“Now that’s a good girl Carly”, Aaron said in a most gratifying tone. “I knew you’d see it my way baby”. The smell of his breath reeked of cheap wine and his teeth were yellow, as if he hadn’t brushed them in days, and the cigarette stains were becoming a permanent tally of the number of years he had been smoking. As Aaron held Carly firmly by the waist and led her over to his beat up Jetta, a car she would otherwise never be caught dead in, her footsteps over the gravel sounded unfamiliar to her.

Carly looked back toward her house and seemed to see herself still there calling through the fog of her mind; the fog that kept her in a dream where a little girl played tea party with her big sister April in the backyard, or the time a boy from school came over and they pretended to get married under the cherry tree blossoms that looked like popcorn. “You may now kiss the bride,” April giggled. And he kissed her the way a husband kisses his bride after they have been married for 20 years, but Carly knew no better and she liked it. If only she could remember that boy’s name.

“Is this the end?” she whispered softly, but Aaron had caught up with her and was too busy concentrating on feeling her firm body pressed up against his. He was too busy holding her waist so tightly Carly felt as if she would pass out at any minute.

As they approached Aaron’s car Ethan stepped out and removed his light blue buttoned up shirt, exposing a silver belt buckle with the initial A. He approached Carly with a grimacing smile, stood two inches from her lips, but then brushed his unshaven cheek against her trembling hand.

“Glad you decided to join us pretty girl.” Pretty girl? Those words ran loops around her fading mind. “Am I a pretty girl now, Momma?” she thought to herself, but her momma was too far to hear the thoughts in Carly’s mind, and too far to pretend they ever shared that kind of connection.

“Hands off Ethan! That’s my girl you’re flirting with!” Aaron yelled like Ethan had just tried to take the last innocent smile off the most beautiful creature left in the world.

“I’m only being friendly now. You ain’t never had a problem with me being friendly!” and he blew a kiss in Carly’s direction making her feel a bit queasy, but at this moment, passing out from queasiness wouldn’t be the answer.

“Get in the back and shut your trap Ethan!”

“Umm I think I need to sit down, I don’t feel well”, Carly said softly, her voice shaking worse than that time she and April went through that damn haunted house the Halloween before last.

“Shut up, girl!”, and Ethan raised his hand to slap her face, but was stopped by Aaron’s powerful fist straight to his jaw, causing a mixture of drool and blood from his mouth, to land on Carly’s cheek. Ethan held his face like a boy who’d been slapped by his mother.

“What the hell is the matter with you? Don’t tell me you really like the bitch. She ain’t nothing but just like the others, just like the others you made to like you, then us.”

“Others? What others Aaron? Why are you doing this? Wasn’t I always nice to you? I thought I was your friend! That’s what you said, aren’t we friends Aaron?” Carly said, her voice shaking.

“Now look Ethan! Look what you done! You’ve gone and scared my sweet Carly!” He stepped toward her, grabbed a lock of her hair, held it up to his nose and inhaled it as if getting high off the idea she washed her hair especially for him.

“I’ve gone did no such thing! Look at her, she wants me. They all give me that look when they want me! Isn’t that right? Don’t ya want me?”, and he reached for her hand but was intercepted by a shove that knocked him to the ground.

“Get up you backstabbing two faced son of a bitch!” Aaron held his fists up taunting his friend to get up and fight for the girl he claimed was his.

“Look at her face man, she wants me!”, and he struck Aaron in the stomach with such force, he knocked him down to the gravel, disturbing the small, well manicured path.

Carly’s heart began to beat so loudly - louder, faster. Time was wasting before the two men realized what the true intention of her heartbeat was.

Acting on a mixture of fear and impulse, Carly jumps in the driver seat of the car, her heart racing, her blood pumping, her mind trying to remember how April managed to balance the clutch of her dad’s Beamer that time they both snuck out after dark, after curfew when the “good girls” were all tucked in asleep. The engine revs, Carly slams the gas pedal with her eyes closed, and pops the clutch. Sweat was dripping down her neck, tickling the idea that she just might get away. The interior of the car seemed drenched in the sweet smelling perfume of girls who didn’t quite get away, fueling Carly to keep going. She drives and passes an old house, scattering chickens every which way, and begins to scream.

Carly gives the broken old Jetta some gas and turns the car around. Her face changes from an overwhelming look of fear to one of wild determination.

Angling the car’s hood in line with the men, she puts the car into first gear and guns the engine. The car’s cheap Goodyear knockoffs gain traction and the little car lunges forward, pinning Carly to her seat. Second gear. They are just a few feet away, getting closer.

Her eyes focus on her targets like a fighter pilot zeroing in on an enemy plane looking for that final kill. Third gear. No, that’s first gear, as the car lurches from her nervous shifting. Third gear. The old car shakes as it approaches its maximum speed. Like a deer caught in the headlights of an approaching semi, the two men just stand there and stare, believing Carly was coming back for them. They weren’t wrong.

The beat up VW is almost on top of them. Carly grips the steering wheel tight, bracing for the impact. The men look at each other in disbelief and attempt to run but it’s too late, the side of the road and safety might as well be a million miles away. The car slams into them with a thud and a sickening crunch. Aaron flies up over the hood and collides with the windshield, shattering it on impact, then slides off to the side of the road. Ethan, being the shorter of the two, is sucked under the car. Carly can feel him under her tires as if she had just driven over a very large dog. She keeps the rickety Jetta floored and doesn’t look back. Her grip begins to loosen on the wheel, her posture changes and her body sinks deeper into the faux leather seat. A great calm envelops her, her fear washing away like a wave that draws all the loose sand into the sea. She drives for what seems like hours. She drives down that road toward freedom, down that road that led to where she could have been.