Fresh Start

I’m spending New Year’s Eve with my Shih-Tzu Millie, sitting on the couch with a novel, sipping wine and eating crackers. I’ll turn on the television when it gets close to midnight. In the meantime, I’m enjoying the last few nights of the Christmas tree and its decorations. Millie tugs at my sweater since I’ve been ignoring her, so I rub her stomach. I check my watch and turn on the television. The ball begins its descent.

As I sit and wait, I reflect on the many mistakes I made and hope the new year will be a fresh start.

From Guest Contributor Lisa M. Scuderi-Burkimsher

Belly/Belie

I remember the push of the needle through my flesh, a burst of pain, the reddened swelling, and then the bruise, spreading like a distorted coneflower from my stomach.

“Sexy,” he mutters later. He pushes my sweater higher up around my breasts, leaning in to kiss the tender flesh around the belly ring. I look up at the ceiling tiles. I close my eyes, and I imagine this ring is a portal. I crawl through the small metal circle, into the deep hull of this ship--a stowaway, hidden from view. I smile. It works. He doesn’t even notice I’m gone.

From Guest Contributor Helen Raica-Klotz

That Day

He dreamt of one. Then another and another...until the sky wascrowded with them. Umbrellas. Pristine white. Open. Descending from uphigh. Why?

They were irrelevant in his daily life. Not so for his wife who neededdifferent umbrellas to complement her wardrobe.

Upon awakening he realized what triggered the scene he envisioned. Whyhe told his boss he wouldn’t be at work that day.

“Does this go with my sweater?” his wife asked, opening an umbrella byhis bedside.

The man quietly slid back under the covers.

No way was he going to move on Friday the 13th.

From Guest Contributor Krystyna Fedosejevs

Krystyna, a former librarian, gathers tidbits from around theworld in her travels, strings them into delectable morsels of poetryand prose, and stores them in her gopher hole in the CanadianPrairies. She is open to sharing, upon request.

Tulsa

She understood Brooklyn. You needed the right glasses, the right shoes, the right jeans. And my God, the hair. You had to nail the hair exactly. If it looked like you were trying too hard, you weren't trying hard enough.

She didn't understand Tulsa. No one seemed to be trying. It would almost be cool, the way nobody seemed to care, except what's the point of being cool if you don't even realize it. She was going to hate it here.

But the sweater-skirt combination on that lady was going to kill when she wore it home for Christmas vacation.