And once I got done sniffling ...

It's not the usual sort of place someone would keep hopes, dreams, and fancies. Some people might write those things down in a book with a pretty picture on the cover, or bound in velvet; a new page for every wish. Still others have hope chests, or boxes; a rainy-day activity, sorting through keepsakes from the past, or icons for future memories.

One fuzzy ear sticking up, the second flopped over one shiny black eye, fangs just peeping over his dapper bow tie. While I sleep, he whispers my hopes and dreams back to me in a voice only I can hear.

CLOVIS!

Sail, that was, quite literally, the only case of a baby having a stroke that I've ever heard of. Never before or since.

To Have and...

When it was over—the sweatyslick movement of skin sliding across skin and a hand or a tongue or was that a shoulder brushing against her body—she was empty and full all at once. His chest pillowed her head; her arm draped his waist. They twined together like satisfaction.

The scent of their bodies combined, a heady musk settling across them, saturating their pores. Later, she would cup her hair to her nose and inhale this moment again. Later, the memory of this would make her smile inconveniently in the middle of a meeting.

Not the sex. The holding.

My contribution.

How the shoebox has survived nearly 25 years I don't know. The letters inside should probably have gone the way of the world long ago. Letters from Joe to my college-aged, naive self. I read them, and I'm her again, and the pain is too real. I'd go back, if I could, and tell her we'd become the kind of woman Joe dreaded, strong and confident. Reading them, though, reminds me that I loved him.

They've been here too long. I reach for the shredder, pause, then grab the matches.

Souls are freed on flaming pyres, and hers is long past due.

Holy crap. Just went back and read the drabbles on this to date.

Erika, that was amazing. The way you repeated the word hold and cycled the passage of time...wow.

Deb, beautifully hopeful. I love how you used Pandora's box here.

Sail, wow. Painful. Wrenching.

Jilli, I love the description of Clovis! I especially love this line: "One fuzzy ear sticking up, the second flopped over one shiny black eye, fangs just peeping over his dapper bow tie." So very evocative.

Connie, that one nearly broke me. Because I burned every single memento I had of the affair that defined the first half of my life, every photograph, every single anything.

It didn't free anything, alas.

What Kristin said. All very inspired pieces, today, including hers. I'm so glad I finally started reading and posting in this thread. I can't believe I was missing out on such good stuff.

Fortunately, the only thing about Joe that I regret is the sex. He listened to Rush Limbaugh before Rush was fashionable and before my opinions finished coalescing. Still, he had his uses, and he convinced me I could be sexy.

Her lungs tremble with the effort and her nostrils burn as they flare uselessly. It's okay if she gets dizzy, a little. She just has to keep quiet.

Slowly, she squirms further and further away from the edge of the bed until her back is braced against the wall's surface. She can see the light under the crack of the door from this far underneath, but she squeezes her eyes shut against the knowledge and tries not to exhale.

Quiet as mice. Quiet as whispers, feathers, dark. Quiet.

The pull on her wrist is harsh and twisting when it comes.

Holding/Containor Drabble #2

The metal cylinder held fifteen coiled sheets, blueprints curled tightly into themselves like a promise. The purple lines traced bedroom, bathroom, kitchen, stairs, closet, another hallway leading to another bedroom leading to another dream of the future. They were the sound of the backhoe digging out the foundation and the swift movement of the hammer hitting the nail. They were the map to a new home, a new debt, a new set of obligations and recriminations and consequences.

The metal cylinder rests against the wall in the living room still, a reminder of how hard concrete becomes once it’s set.