Got it!

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As is very often when I write nowadays, am wishing I hadn't been quite so honest.

Well, yeah, because this is raw:

It’s just, totally obvious.I’m just, like nothing? Mom says it’ll get better one day, but she’s my mom, what would she say? That she got pregnant with a nobody? Especially after almost dying over it? I think not.She has to at least fake like we’re something, or her life’s a big waste.

I mean "raw" as high compliment, but I'm raw myself, just from reading it.

Susan, I can't read it tonight, but I can try for tomorrow morning (my morning) if you want to send it. Gmail is good. I think we've exchanged emails, when I've used that address.

Sail, the end of yours gave me goosebumps. Connie, your drabble would have given me goose bumps, but then you disclaimered yourself and made me laugh. We know it's not you, you goober (or is it...)

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I am all about the beta reading, so, insending to those who requested.

connie, for some reason, I found that heartbreaking.

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I'll take a look at it, Susan, if you need any more sets of eyes. What sort of stuff do you want feedback on?

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Insent, Hil, with details about feedback desired.

Cindy, I'd love to send it to you, too, but I don't think I have your gmail. Should I just use your profile addy?

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We know it's not you, you goober (or is it...)

I'm feeling oddly (oddly, sheesh) sane today and decided for a lark to distance myself from my more homicidal urges. I'm sure I'll be back to normal in a couple of days.

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deb, your drabble made me go, "Whoa." And erika, I loved them. Very powerful.

Mine is not yet shadow self. I might actually try fiction on that later, because my nano characters are still bopping around, trying to tell their story.

In Three Dimensions

It was part of falling in love. Red and blue par cans overhead cast their colored shadows on the wooden stage floor. I was hopping from foot to foot, playing with the shadows, making them dance and leap over the chairs and grand piano.

"They must be three dimensional," he mused.

"What?"

"The shadows. Look, when you move, darkness extends all the way from where you are to the stage."

We talked for hours about the nature of light and shadow, the meaning of darkness and brightness. I looked at him, delighted, and watched the reflections in his blue eyes.

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I should gather up all the ones about him and show him. He thinks I never write about him, which is almost true. My songwriting, except for the fluffy anomalous (Hee, had to check the spelling on that 'cause of Numb3rs.) stuff, all comes out of pain. So he rarely makes it into that. Well, these days, anyway.

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So he rarely makes it into that. Well, these days, anyway.

We were separated at birth? Just curious.

Brilliant damned drabble, too.

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The Long Arms of the Dead

They say the dead travel fast.

I'll believe that; what else have they got to do? Oh - wait. There's that thing about haunting the living.

I'm living. I breathe and feel and orgasm and dream, eat too much starch when I'm annoyed, and don't eat anything when I'm heartbroken. I'm animal, not vegetable, yet I reach for sunlight, emotional photosynthesis.

They say the dead travel fast. Maybe they do. Maybe that isn't the point.

What the beloved dead do to me is to block the sun, withhold its light. Fast or slow, the dead cast a long, long shadow.

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