On The Money Trail

Family members need help. I oblige. I’m their doer of tasks.

Why me? I’m between jobs, behind with payments and I haven’t shopped for new clothes in ages. I guess they trust me to deliver. I’m okay with that.

No time to linger. Housebound auntie wants her groceries.

As I hasten, sunshine glues sweaty polyester to my back. I spot sparkles on the sunlit lawn along my walkway.

Coins! Many coins, strewn in a line towards the space where a car had once parked.

I gather, add up their value, sigh.

Someone’s emptied change-purse or pocket. My bit of fortune. From Guest Contributor Krystyna Fedosejevs

Krystyna writes poetry, fiction and creative nonfiction regardless of the season or location she finds herself in.

Prisoners

Auntie asks my mother and I to move out of her house. She says I make too much noise when I sleepwalk and my rock albums are causing Uncle Herman more brain damage from his tour of duty in Afghanistan. Upstairs, I take down my posters of Geronimo, John Lennon, and James Dean from the finely cracked yellow walls. Exhausted, my mother sits on my bed and breaks down. “It’s all your fault,” she says. As if I had the power. At night tiny policemen march into my ears. I’m not sure it’s a dream. They say come with us.

From Guest Contributor Kyle Hemmings

Kyle's latest collection of text and art is Amnesiacs of Summer published by Yavanika Press. He loves street photography, French Impressionism, and 60s garage bands that never made it big.