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12 of 52

Bill

Bill pulled up to the bus depot in his beat-up white van. It was early, the sun still not quite up, but enough so that the world was gray instead of dark. He sat for a moment, the headlights cutting a swath in the dying darkness. The station had seen better days. Those days were also some of the worst ones in Bill’s life. 

A picture was taped to the dash, one of two white kids before life took a bad turn. A dark-haired boy had his arm around a smaller boy, one with a cow lick that jutted from the side of his head. Bill touched the right side of his skull. Though at least fifty years had passed since that picture was taken, the eternal cowlick remained. A smudge of dirt was on the older boy’s face. They both wore mischievous smiles. Bill touched the image and took a deep breath. He killed the headlights, shut off the van and got out. His legs ached and his back hurt. The arthritis in his hands would flare up before he made it back home that afternoon but that didn’t matter. The people here, those in need, they are what mattered to Bill. 

He went to the back door, pulled the handle up and opened the right side. Though he could smell the food while in the cab, it always had a richer aroma from the side or the back. He pressed a latch on the left door, releasing it. He pulled a folding table from the left side, set it on the ground before unfolding its legs and setting it upright. 

By then, the chatter had started, voices in the darkness. Among those were whispers of “He’s here.”

He pulled the table further from the back of the van and closed the double doors. The side door came next. He pulled tin trays of eggs and bacon, toast and grits, nothing special, but something to the homeless who used the bus depot and the outlying areas as places to rest their heads or hunker down against the rain. Some of those people were full families of three or four or five. Orange juice and water and sweet tea went on the tables, along with paper plates and cups and plastic utensil packs. 

Lastly, he closed the van’s side door and walked to the table where he opened the first package of plates. When he looked up, a man around who could have been a couple years older than him—late sixties, maybe very early seventies—stood at the table. He barely looked at Bill, averting his eyes, possibly from shame and embarrassment. 

“Good morning,” Bill said.

“Morning, sir,” the other man replied, keeping his eyes diverted.

“Bill. Just Bill.” He smiled, trying to show warmth. “Would you like some breakfast?”

“Yes, si … yes, Bill.”

He made the man a plate, handed it over and told him to get something to drink and a pack of utensils, then he added, “Have a good day.”

“Thank you, Bill,” the man said and walked off, his head down, plate in both hands. Bill watched him go with a touch of sadness pulling at his heart. 

“You’re welcome.”

For the next two hours, Bill did the same thing for every person who came to the table. As each person walked off, he repeated the same thing he said to the first man. “Have a good day.”

After the last of the homeless came through, he packed up. The rest of the food would go to a local shelter. By then, the sun was out and traffic along the lower part of downtown had picked up considerably. Most of the homeless people had moved on to other spots. With everything back in the van, he closed the back door and started for the driver’s door.

“Excuse me, Sir.”

He turned. An older black lady with a slight hunch in her back stood at the entrance to the bus depot. Her hair was short, almost nonexistent. Grooves cut into her face from a long life or maybe a hard one. She stepped outside and let the door close behind her. She approached with an easy stride that didn’t match her appearance. 

“Can I help you, Ma’am?”

“No, sir, but I would like to help you.”

“Help me?”

She nodded and held out an envelope. “I see you out here three times a week all by yourself. You bring food to the homeless. You are one of those people who are good for the world. I just want to help pay for some of the food you give.”

Bill smiled and put his hand up. He shook his head. “That’s not necessary.”

“Maybe not, but I’d like to help.”

“If you want to help, give that money to one of the local shelters. They’re in need of a lot more than food. As for me …” Bill looked around as memories traced his way across his mind. “My parents died before I turned twelve. My brother and I had no family, no place to stay and no food to eat. I spent many nights here with my brother on one of the benches or around back where the terminals are. I always said if I was able to make something of myself, I would come back and feed the people and give back to the community. This … this … I enjoy doing this. I enjoy helping people. So, thank you, but give that money to any of the local shelters. I’m sure they would appreciate it.”

The woman nodded. “You’re an angel, Mister.”

Bill almost laughed at this. “I’m no angel but thank you.”

Bill got into the van. Before he left, he looked at the picture of the two white boys. He touched the image of his brother, Robert. Though he left Bill’s life when he was nineteen, Bill missed him more and more each day. He backed out of the spot he had occupied for nearly three hours and turned the van toward the parking lot’s exit. A glance in the rearview mirror showed him the backdoor windows. The first person he had fed that day stood leaning against the window jam, his arms crossed over his chest. 

The man waved. Bill’s eyes widened. 

“Robert.”

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11 of 52

A Time To Remember

We sat on the ground near the Thomas family grave site. The grass was still short for that time of year when winter was waving goodbye and spring was taking her own sweet time arriving. It was mid-afternoon. The sun had begun its slow decent and would be gone in a couple of hours. A soft breeze blew through the cemetery, ruffling my hair and sending a chill into my arms. I pulled my legs close to my chest and hugged them tight. My head hurt. It always hurts.

Jerry sat to my left. His appearance was a complete contrast to mine. I wore jeans and sneakers and a light coat with plastic sunglasses sitting on the bridge of my nose. He wore a black suit with a white button-down shirt beneath the blazer. His black shoes were as shiny as the day they came off the shelf at the Pic and Pay in the next town over. My hair was a tangled mess, and I hadn’t washed it in a few days. His was neatly combed with a part on the right side. I always wanted a part, but my hair didn’t seem to think it was a good idea. 

“The sun’s going down,” he said in his always soft voice.  

“It is,” was all I could think to say. We both knew what it meant, but I wasn’t ready to do anything more than acknowledge it.

“Remember when we were little, your dad used to take us fishing?”

“Yes,” I said. “How could I forget?” 

Truthfully, I had forgotten. But I remembered Dad, his Popeye arms, dark hair, and stubbled face always in need of a shave. Even after Mom barked at him once and said he had more whiskers than a dog, he still only shaved occasionally. 

“Do you remember riding in his boat with those horrible orange life jackets strapped on?”

I smiled. “Yeah. Those were the worst.”

“And the bomb islands. I loved going there. Remember when we found the blown-out shell casing of one bomb? Your dad yelled at you when you picked it up. It didn’t matter that there was a hole in it you could see right through. He yelled all the same.” Jerry raised a fist in the air like an angry old man. “Adam, don’t move!”

“He was afraid I would drop it and it would go off.”

“He ran at us like his hair was on fire that day.”

I laughed. Yeah, I remembered that, but only vaguely. A surge of pain ripped through the right side of my head. I took a deep breath and let it out. I blinked several times, hoping to push the pain away with no luck.

The sun dipped lower and lower. The sky wasn’t quite bright, but more of a fading yellow and orange color, as if someone took a paintbrush and ran it along the skyline. 

“Dad never took us back there,” I said.

“I haven’t been back since,” Jerry said, as if I hadn’t spoken at all.

I looked at him. He wasn’t facing me. His hands were behind him in the grass, his legs stretched out in front of him. His eyes faced the sun and there was so much sadness in them. 

Neither of us spoke for a while after that. We stared at the dying sun. The sky was less purple and orange and more gray. On the horizon where Earth met the sky was a sliver of intense orange that should have hurt my eyes but didn’t. Still, the pain in my head increased. It felt like my skull was splitting into two.

Jerry licked his lips. “Your dad …” He shook his head. “Man, he liked to drink.”

“Yeah, he did. All the time.”

Jerry let out a deep breath. “I wish he hadn’t been drinking that day.”

I nodded. “I wish he never drank at all.”

“If he hadn’t been drinking …” he shrugged. “Maybe things would be different.”

“Maybe.”

“It started raining on the way back. Do you remember that, Adam?”

“I do,” I said, and that was the truth. I did remember. A storm came out of nowhere. The sky had darkened with black clouds that blocked out the sun. Lightning streaked across the sky and brought loud booms of thunder with it. And we were on the water in a metal johnboat.  The wind had picked up and the waves had become choppy. The boat skipped along the water like a flat rock tossed from a little kid’s hand. I remembered that well.

“He was going too fast as he rounded Charlie’s Cove. Way too fast.”

The pain in my head made things fuzzy, but I could recall the fear I felt as I sat in the bottom of the boat with my hands clutched to its sides. 

“He hit that wave … he hit that wave and we went sideways.”

I remembered. He didn’t need to say anymore. The last thing I recalled while being alive was being flung from the boat and landing, headfirst in the water. Then I ended up here.

I looked at Jerry. He looked older than I remembered. We had barely reached our teens when the accident happened. I looked back at me, at the old jeans I wore, the coat and sneakers. The sunglasses on my head had been there when I died. He was a young man, still grieving a friend who had died years prior. I was the friend.

The sun had finally set. In a little while the moon would come up with its calming white, glowing face. Maybe it would bring some stars with it. Maybe …

Jerry stood and wiped his bottom with his hands. He took a deep breath, then a few steps. He stopped at a headstone that was new compared to so many others in the cemetery. He patted the stone. “I miss you, Adam.”

He wiped at his eyes, shoved his hands into his pockets and walked off, his head down. All I could do was watch him go. Eventually, I stood and went to the headstone. I read my name, my age, the Gone Too Soon, inscription. And my headache was gone.

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10 of 52

This Place

Chet sat alone in a blue chair that might have been meant for a beach, but instead was around a metal firepit with chairs of the same type. A slight breeze blew through his hair. A car went by, a song he didn’t know blaring from it until it was off in the distance. There were too many people, mostly younger than him.

He didn’t know this place, had never been there until that day, but he knew he didn’t like it. It was too busy, with its crowded streets, loud music and people, and stores, stores, stores. Everything about that place screamed commercialism. He wanted to be home, away from the noise and the people, where trees dominated the landscape instead of concrete buildings, where animals roamed the countryside instead of cars zooming by on roads, where the sounds you heard were leaves rustling in the same breeze he felt right then, birds chirping and bees buzzing from flower to flower.

Instead, he sat, uncomfortably, as a group of young men set up instruments on a stage at the end of the building. There was a cover over the stage meant to protect anyone playing from the elements of weather; the sun, rain, the cold—the last of those he had his doubts about. Based on the long sleeves the five men wore, they had theirs, too.

After several quiet minutes to himself, his wife, Allie, came to her seat next to him. She had a beer in one hand—bottled not draft. He smiled at this. She wasn’t a country girl by any stretch of the imagination, but with her hair pulled into a ponytail and a bottled beer in hand, he thought she pulled off the look quite well. 

“When are they going on?” she asked and sat down.

Chet looked at his watch—not a digital deal, and not a phone, but an honest to goodness analogue watch with ticking hands and lines for minutes. “In about ten minutes, I reckon.”

“Are you excited to see them play?”

He shrugged. “I’ve seen ‘em play plenty of times.”

“Watching your brothers play at home or church is one thing, but they’re getting paid to play here.”

“They’ve been paid before …” he said and looked around. “… just not in a place like this.”

“You mean not in the city?”

He nodded. “Yup.”

“You don’t like it here, do you?”

“Not particularly.”

“Why?”

“It’s too …” He shook his head, looking for the words.

“Busy?” Allie interjected.

“Nope. That’s not the word I’m looking for. It’s too fast. People hurrying by like there’s no tomorrow, like, I don’t know, they don’t have the time to stop and smell the roses, or in this case, the exhaust fumes.”

Allie laughed at this, took a drink of her beer. “I guess this means you don’t want to move to the city?”

Chet frowned at this. He knew by being here that question would come up. “If you want to move back—and I know you do—I’ll do it. If that’s what’ll make you happy, then I’ll do what I need to.”

“I hear a ‘but’ coming?”

He took a deep breath. “But this place … this isn’t for a country boy like me. I feel about as out of place as vegetarian at an all meat buffet.”

For half a minute they sat in silence. Then Chet spoke the most honest words he could think to say. “I know you want to move back home. I also know you won’t ask me to do that. Just know if you want to come home … to this place …” He waved one hand in the air, motioning their surroundings. “… then I’ll move the earth and moon to make it happen. As long as we’re together …”

Allie didn’t respond, but he saw the smile on her face. She reached for his hand as The Bluegrass Brothers began their first song. At the end of the song, she released his hand. 

“It’s just a place,” she said. 

He nodded. “Yup.”

AJB

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8 of 52

Passing Clouds

He sat in the hospital room alone. It was the first time since his heart attack that someone wasn’t in there. Even at night when he was asleep—or trying to sleep if the nurses would just stay out of there—someone had been sleeping on the couch. The first two nights it was Evelyn. Last night his son, John, stayed over. He was as restless as Norvell was, but probably because he was too tall for the loveseat the hospital called a couch. It didn’t look all that comfortable.

But right then, no one was there. Evelyn was at the house. John stepped out to make a phone call and the nurse—Cruella, he thought of her as with that white streak in her otherwise black hair and the stern tone to her voice—had done her morning rounds. He thought he might have ten or fifteen minutes of peace. 

The clock on the wall to the right of his bed was nothing more than a cheap dollar store battery operated thing. The second hand tick ticked away. It read seventeen minutes after three in the afternoon. Norvell stared out the window. Gray clouds rolled by. Earlier John said a storm was on the way. With the way the clouds moved, Norvell thought it might be a doozy. Black clouds began taking the place of the gray ones as he watched. He thought they moved a little faster than they should. He frowned. Yup, a doozy indeed.

“I see a face,” he said. His voice cracked and sounded tired, almost breathless. He shook his head slowly. He raised his hands.. They were thin and wrinkly and there were several liver spots on them. HIs wrists looked too thin for his liking.  “When did I get so old?”

The face in the clouds rushed by, replaced by gray and black and the occasional puff of white that looked like the only clean spot on an otherwise dirty sky. As the clouds moved along, a swirl of white clung to the underside of a dark one.

“That looks like a cinnamon roll.”

Norvell smiled at this. 

A laugh came from his right. When he looked, a kid stood there in brown pants, a tan button-down shirt and brown suspenders. His feet were bare and his face was smudged with dirt. 

“Hey, Ed,” he said. The kid smiled, showing he was missing two teeth.

“Hey, Norvell, Ed said, then added, “That does look like a cinnamon roll. Remember Grams’ cinnamon rolls?”

Norvell nodded. Grams was his grandmother and she baked the best cinnamon rolls. She put them in the open window of her kitchen to cool before scooping them out of the pan.  “They were the best.”

“Yeah, they were.”

They sat in silence for a minute, then Ed pointed with one long finger at the clouds. “Is that a cat?”

Norvell shook his head. “No. That’s a lion.”

“I guess so. Remember how we used to lay in the field out behind the house when were kids?”

“I do,”

“We watched the clouds go by with our hands behind our heads.”

“And we chased the rainbows after storms.”

Ed nodded. “Those were good times.”

“The best times.”

Another minute passed. Norvell didn’t look back at his older brother who died when he was only thirteen thanks to a clumsy fall off a wall and a busted skull. “It’s time, isn’t it?” he asked.

“We can watch the clouds a little longer,” Ed said. “Whenever you’re ready, just close your eyes and the clouds will stop moving.”

Norvell nodded. He thought of Evelyn, of how hard his health issues have been for her. He thought of John, of the many times he took off from work or left his own family to take him to the doctor or the hospital and the many nights he slept on too short and uncomfortable  couches like the one in the room he was in. 

He looked at the clock on the wall again. The hands had stopped moving and it read nineteen minutes after three. Norvell’s lips turned up slightly, then he looked back out the window. 

“What do those look like?” Ed asked and pointed to the window where white clouds tried to overtake the gray and black ones. A flash of lightning was followed by a rumble of thunder. 

“Angels,” he whispered as the clouds continued to move along briskly. “I’m ready.” Norvell closed his eyes … 

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7 of 52

She was a pretty woman. At least, Arlo thought she was. In truth, he had never seen her from the front, just from the back and only when passing the display window of the department store on Main Street, U.S.A. She set up the displays and almost always had her back to the people passing by. 

She was short with long dark hair and always wore jeans and a nice top, usually of the tee variety. He thought she wore sneakers but wasn’t too certain. It would be a lie to say he never checked her figure out, but after the first two or three times, he didn’t notice her body so much as he noticed her lack of concern for anyone walking by. Or maybe it was confidence in herself that made her appealing. Or maybe it was how gracefully she moved. 

He wondered what her voice sounded like, what she thought when she looked at an empty display. Did she have an idea of what she would create? Did she view it as a blank canvas for her to create art on, or as just a job she was paid to do? He didn’t know any of these things. He had never spoken to her. Never actually seen her face (which, in his opinion, if her backside looked nice, then her front surely did). He never even waved at her. 

He almost waved once—it was the lone time he thought she was about to turn around. He walked by the window and looked. She was there, her hands on her hips. He noticed no ring on the left hand. She took a step forward, then started to turn. Arlo stopped. His hand came out of his pocket, got halfway up, then dropped to his side. She didn’t turn to look out the glass. She walked around the display she had been working on and disappeared in an opening off to the left.

Arlo’s shoulders sagged that day. 

Just go in and talk to her, he told himself.

That would be awfully bold, he argued.

At least you would get to meet her.


What if she doesn’t like me?

You’ll never know if—

I know. I know. I’ll never know if I don’t try.

He didn’t try. Not that day and not any day since. 

Maybe today, he thought as he approached the department store. It was on his right as he headed to the parking garage nearly two blocks from where he worked. At the end of the block, he would make a right, step into a doorway, get on an elevator and go up to the sixth floor where his car was parked, like most days.

She’s not going to be there.

Resigned to the thought, he tucked his hands into his pockets. He crossed the street when the little white walking man appeared. A robotic voice proclaimed, “Walk sign is on. Walk sign is on.” Before he could get across the street that same voice began to count down from ten. He reached the other side of the road by seven. On the sidewalk, he lowered his head, intent on not looking at the window. If he didn’t see her, he wouldn’t feel shame for not …

But she was there in light blue jeans and a white top that was tucked in neatly. A black belt held her pants up and yes, she was wearing sneakers. Her dark hair was pulled back in a ponytail and she was standing, not with her back to the window, but to the side. 

Arlo stopped. His mouth dropped open slightly. His heart sped up. She wore no makeup. Arlo didn’t think she needed any. Her face was round, cheeks a natural pink, lips thin, eyes like almonds, in shape and color. 

His hand went up slowly. He couldn’t stop it if he wanted to. He gave a slight wave that caught her attention. She looked at him, smiled and lifted her hand in response.  

Heat filled Arlo’s face and neck and his stomach soured. His world spun for a second. Then his feet pulled him away and he hurried off, trying to reach the corner where he would run to the garage and up the steps—forget the elevator—and too his car. His heart would probably explode before getting there, but he didn’t care. The woman in the window was more than pretty, she was gorgeous, and she had smiled and waved at him. 

Before he reached the corner, he heard a female voice behind him. “Hey. Don’t run away.”

Arlo stopped. He looked back. The woman was no longer in the display window but walking toward him. She stopped about ten feet in front of him, the smile on her face warm and welcoming.

“I was wondering how long it would take you to make a move.”

“Make a move?” Arlo asked.

“You pass by here every day. I’ve seen you looking at me.”

Heat rose in his cheeks. Sweat beaded on his forehead. “I’m sorry. I … just … you’re …”

She laughed. “It’s okay. I’m not creeped out by you. I’ve never had someone admire me from afar like that.”

“I … umm …” No words came. He thought he would pass out. 

Then she stuck out her hand. “I’m Carolyn. It’s nice to finally meet you.”

He took her hand. It was warm and soft. “My name is Arlo.”

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5 of 52

My brother and I were never the best of friends. He lied. A lot. He stole. A lot. He cheated. A lot. He did a lot of things I never thought good people would do. I never thought he was a good person. 

He was three years older than me and far meaner than I would ever become. He beat me up more than a few times.

I was eleven when my grandfather broke up a particularly nasty argument that had me lash out and punch Bart as hard as I could. He saw the punch, not what led to it. He sent Bart in the house for some ice and some good old-fashioned consoling from our grandmother. I imagined he would twist this into some lie, and I would get the blame for it somehow. I was right, but that’s not what this is about.

Granddad pulled me aside and said, “Do you want to play marbles?”

I was confused. Was this a calm before the storm?

He nodded. “Sure, you do.”

He went to the porch and grabbed my marbles off the swing. They were in a purple Crown Royal bag my dad gave me. He came back to where I stood, still unsure of what was happening. He knelt, wiped dirt away with his palm and drew a circle with a stick in the clearing he had made. The marbles went into the circle and we each picked out a shooter, his a plain green one, mine a shiny purple one with white speckles. 

We only played for a few minutes. At one point, I took my shot and knocked a yellow and white swirled marble from the circle. Before I could pick it up, he did. 

“That’s mine,” I said.

He looked at it. “It is.” Then he reached into the circle and picked out another yellow and white swirled marble. He held his hand out, the two marbles side by side on his palm. Then he closed his hands.

He spoke in the way only he could, calm, soothing and wise. “Brett this circle is your world, your surroundings. These marbles …” He pointed to the ones within the circle. “… are the members of your family. These two …” He held up the two yellow and white swirled marbles, one between each pointer finger and thumb. “… are you and your brother.”

Grandad dropped one marble inside the circle. “This one is you.” He dropped the other one on the outside of the circle. “This one is your brother.”

He paused, as if thinking of what to say next. “Sometimes, you will not like your family. Sometimes they will do things that make you mad and you will not want to be around them. But they will always be your family.” He picked up the marble representing my brother. “You may not like him, but Bart is your brother and one day … one day you will wish you kept him in your circle.”

Grandad set the marble back in the circle, stood and went inside the house. I stared at it for a moment or two, then scooped them all up and placed them back in the bag. At some point, I lost track of that bag of marbles.

Life went on and Bart and I never really got along again. 

Twenty years have passed since that day. I found the bag of marbles the other day as I helped clean my grandparents’ house. It had been sitting empty since Grandad’s death a year ago. The bag was at the bottom of one dresser in the room I slept in when I was a kid. I opened it up and dumped the marbles out. Among them were two white and yellow swirled ones—my brother and I. 

I stared at it for a long while …

…

…

Now, here I stand, at my brother’s grave. It’s been four years since drugs took him in the form of an overdose. When I leave, I will go visit Grandad and tell him he was right—I wish I would have kept Bart in my circle. For now, I will stand here a little longer, silent and in thought. Before I leave, I will set one of the two yellow marbles on his head stone. I will never have him back in the circle, but maybe … maybe this will wash away some of the guilt and pain I feel. I doubt it, but it’s worth a shot.

***

Before anyone asks, the only thing true in this story is the game of marbles and the conversation my grandfather and I had when I was a kid. Yes, it did come after a moment of fighting between me and my real brother, but it never escalated to the point of the two brothers in this story—thankfully.

AJB

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2 of 52

Before you read this piece, let me state up front, it is an odd story, mostly told in reverse. For the most part, you can read it from the first paragraph, like a normal story, and read it to the end, or you can start from the end and work your way to the top. It’s very much an experimental piece that was difficult to write, especially in so few words. 

I hope you enjoy the story and don’t get too confused. Let me know what you think in the comments below.

Maryjo

A.J. Brown

The light was on in the lone room on the third floor. That’s where Maryjo lived before she died. She had been smoking a cigarette in the bed and fell asleep. The cigarette started a fire on her blanket and the bed went up in flames. She was 43 when she died. And there was a light on in her room.

The second floor window on the east side had a hole in it. Maryjo lived in that room for a while before moving to the third floor. A not so lovelorn guy tossed a brick through it. The brick held a love letter on a piece of paper wrapped in rubber bands to hold it in place. Marry me, Maryjo, was written in black marker on the paper. It creeped Maryjo out and she moved to the third floor. She was 38 then. The window was never fixed.

There’s another window with a hole in it on the west side of the house. A brick didn’t break this one. A rock did. Smaller and easier to throw. It struck Maryjo in her blonde curly-haired head. It left a nasty gash, lump, and painful bruise. It gave her a concussion that caused severe headaches and nausea. She moved to the East side room on the second floor after that, hoping with it not being on the open side of the house, nothing like that would happen again. She was 31 then.

On the first floor of the old Victorian house are three bedrooms. East room number two is on the backside of the house. A door next to the room opens to the outside if you are inside and to the inside if you are outside. At first, she didn’t mind being next to the door. She could come and go as she wanted with neither parent wise to her, well, coming and going. Then came the random knocking at all hours of the night. It started as soft taps and gradually grew to angered thumps then heavy kicks until the door jamb split one night. Dad didn’t hear the soft taps or even the knocks, but he heard the angered thumps and the kick that broke the door. He ran off the person—someone dressed in black who was never identified. That scared her enough to make her move to the second floor. She was 25 then.

East room one wasn’t really on the East side of the house but more towards the West side. Maryjo liked this room more than the others with its high ceilings and lone window that faced out at the field behind the house. There were trees beyond the field and on the other side of those trees is where Clint Hall and his family once lived. 

Maryjo loved Clint and dreamed of marrying him one day. He often came through those trees and across the field to see her. She watched him approach on his way there, then on his way home. 

Clint and his family died long before Maryjo did in a similar way. Unlike with Maryjo, a cigarette didn’t burn just her and her bed up, it ended up taking the entire house, Clint, and his family as well.

Heartbroken, Maryjo moved to East room number two so she could no longer look out at the field for who was never to come that way again. She was 20.

The West room sat closest to the front of the house. Maryjo lived in that room the longest, from birth until she moved to East room one. There were no pink walls or unicorn posters. It was just a room, almost like a place of waiting … waiting for another room to open for her. She hated the West room more than any room in the house. She was sixteen when she left the West room behind, choosing to leave bad memories alone and start anew in East room one. She never returned to the West room, where a monster lurked in the shadows and where sleep was often interrupted.

Once upon a time, she had a brother. He smoked cigarettes before he was twelve and liked Uncle Billy’s moonshine. He was sent away for doing things to little girls. No one has seen him since. He was nineteen when he vacated East room one and she moved in. 

Maryjo didn’t smoke. 

AJB

Posted on by ajbrown

Church Bells Contest Entry

Currently over at Stitched Smile Publications Magazine’s website, there is a contest going on. There are 5 stories so far, and yes, I wrote one. So, go check them out. Make sure and like and comment on your favorite stories (those count as votes, and no, you do not have to vote for mine) Seriously, like and comment on them. We apprecaite it.

https://stitchedsmilemagazine.wordpress.com/2022/08/06/welcome-to-stitched-saturday/comment-page-1/#comment-36

Posted on by ajbrown

One Step Forward …

Good morning, y’all.

On my Patreon page, One Step Forward, three new posts are up: Part 7 of One Step Forward. Part 7 of the serialized novel, Unbroken Crayons, and Part 1 of a new short story. If you’re a Patreon member, head over, check them out. If you are not a Patreon member, head over, check out the page–there are some posts that are available to nonmembers–and maybe consider joining.

https://www.patreon.com/onestepforward

Until we meet again, my friends, be kind to one another.

A.J.

Posted on by ajbrown · 3 Comments

Reviews, Reviews, Reviews

If you’ve been following this page for the last 10 years (yes, it has been almost 10 years!), then you know I’m a story teller. I’ve posted a LOT of stories on here over the years. Before I continue, if you have been following this page, even for a day, thank you. I honestly wasn’t sure this page would go that long, and I’m happy it has. 

If you’re a lurker, thank you. If you’re someone who comments, thank you. Just the fact that you are here, is awesome. Now, let’s get down to business.

I’m seeking reviews for my books. Yes, I know, I’m always seeking reviews. What writer isn’t? Over the next few months, I’m going to give away 10 free ebooks of each of my books to 10 people. No, I’m not giving them away all at once. It will be one book at a time, every 2 to 4 weeks. The catch? You have to review the book, and no, not a year from now, but preferably within 6 weeks of receiving the ebook. 

Yes, I am trying to garner some reviews for some of my books that don’t have many. And, yes, I am trying to garner some reviews for my books that also have over 20.

You get a book for free. I get a review. 

If you want to review more than one book, great. Read one. Review it. Request another one. 

Also, the review can go on a personal blog or Goodreads or Amazon, or even here on this site as a comment on the page the book is on (or all of the above). 

I’m thinking of starting with The Forgetful Man’s Disease, one of my favorite stories that a lot of folks haven’t read (but more details on that in the next couple of days).

If you are interested, please comment below and leave me your email address. Again, thank you for being here and your interest in my works.

Until we meet again, my friends, be kind to one another.

A.J.