DEBORAHSHINEGARDEN.COM

Out of the Dark

Debs2 — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 12:38:00 GMT

Not many people crossed under the Gowanus Expressway by foot, especially after dark. Even the police stayed away.Abigail pulled the hood of her raincoat forward and tightened the strings as she walked down the center of the empty sidewalk. Her heels clicked against the cement, echoing like a beacon to all the creatures hidden inside the abandoned warehouses.

"Hey pretty lady!" A voice called, and then whistled.

"Mama-sita" said a deeper voice.

She hugged her purse and quickened her pace.

The wet sidewalks reflected amber light from the streetlamps. A large brown rat darted out from underneath a parked car and crossed her path. Abigail jumped back and gasped- catching the scream before it escaped her lips. The rat disappeared into the darkness.

She crossed against the light. It dripped a long, green glow into the asphalt.

Someone whistled.

"Where you going pretty lady?" the man called out."Why you leaving us so soon?"

She looked around. She tightened one hand into a fist around the strap of her purse while she slipped the other into her pocket and gripped the steel within.

Abigail turned the corner and found herself face-to-face with a large man in a trench coat and black baseball hat. Shadows hid his features.

"Not so fast," he whispered.

A second man emerged from a doorway behind her but she could not turn around to see him. This new offender ran his finger along her shoulder. She flinched. A sinister smile formed upon the first man’s lips.

"The party is just starting," the second one said.He slid his hand along her waist, felt the curve of her ass, and squeezed.

Abigail tried to jerk her body back, but he wrapped his arms around her torso. Her eyes locked into the first man’s gaze.

"Don't touch me!" Abigail's determination cracked along with her voice.

One tear rolled down her cheek, and then another.

Her captor whispered into her ear. "You are one fine-looking lady."

His body pressed into her back. She smelled cheap booze and cigarettes on his breath and felt his arousal pressing into her thigh.

He took a deep breath through his nose. "Mmm, and you smell good too."

She struggled, but he held her in place. The man with the trench coat watched, never blinking. He leaned forward. She shut her eyes, winced,and turned her head to one side. He licked the tear from her cheek with a long,slow stroke.

"Come, now," he said to the other man.

Abigail’s captor covered her mouth. He pulled her into the building while the trench coat wearer slammed the door behind them. A bang reverberated through the dark.

The second man leaned her up against the wall, keeping his hand over her mouth. Abigail’s eyes widened. She tried to shake her head against his grip.

"Just like a young filly," said the first man through a thick accent. He leaned in close. "You know what they do with fillies?"

She shook her head again—not so much in response as protest.

"Break-them-in.”

While the other still held her, this first man reached out and squeezed her breast. She tried to scream through his grip.

Her eyes narrowed and brows creased as she slipped her handout of her coat pocket and clicked off the safety of her gun. They did not see it.

She pushed the metal into the second man's stomach and squeezed the trigger. The fiery blast ruptured the air inside the warehouse.His grip relaxed and he fell. She felt the wet blood spray all over her coat, legs and shoes. Abigail re-cocked the hammer of gun and aimed into the other man's face.

"Now-now—" He lifted his hands and stepped back.

She shot him before he finished his sentence. He dropped to the floor. Abigail’s hands shook as she flicked the safety back onto the gun.

"Fuck you." She screamed. She put it back into her pocket, spat on the floor, and returned to the street. Her heels clicked against the sidewalk.

Long Road to Long Island

Debs2 — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 03:51:00 GMT

Diane knew her family was waiting for her when she opened the passenger door of the old Datsun station wagon. Shelly kept the engine idling while she tapped the steering wheel, leaning her head forward to watch her daughter get into the car.

Diane flopped down and slammed the door. Diane’s grandmother sat in the back seat,next to her brother Max, who occupied himself with a purple plastic pony. His feet dangled just over the edge of the seat, providing him with the perfect opportunity to kick the back of Diane’s chair.

“Max,please stop kicking me!”

“I’m not kicking you!”

Shelly pulled out of the driveway,announcing, “I have a few stops to make.”

Diane sighed. She knew that her mother’s stops could take hours. She threw her arms up. “You said we were going straight to Marlene’s house!”

“Well, I have some stops to make first.”

“How many?”

“What difference does it make?”

Diane pulled the Walkman out of her coat pocket.

Shelly stopped at a red light and stared at Diane as she unraveled the earphones. “I don’t want to hear your hock-in-cup music.”

“Don’t worry, I have headphones.”

“I can hear it through the headphones.”

“No you can’t.”

Diane opened the Walkman and checked the tape, Juda’s Priest Live. She closed the cassette door and pushed the play button.Meanwhile her mother turned the radio on and flipped through the channels until she found the Jewish station. A group of men sang in Hebrew.

Diane pushed the play button. Rob Halford chanted “Breaking-the-law,Breaking-the-Law” into her ears. Shelly cranked the volume up on the car radio so that it overpowered Diane’s headphones.

“Can you turn that down just a little?” Diane asked. “It is the most obnoxious crap I’ve ever heard.” She reached for the dial but Shelly slapped her hand away.

“No-I don’t want to hear that head-splitting noise you call music. Besides, it is important to understand your Jewish heritage.”

“Mom,a bunch of Hassids singing about the coming of Mechiach to the tune Michael Jackson’s Thriller is not exactly Jewish Heritage!”

“Shelly– leave the kid alone,” Her grandmother interjected. “It’s too loud back here anyway.”

Diane knew that her mother only turned the volume down enough to pacify her grandmother, but continue drowning out her Walkman. She could feel her mother’s eyes shift from the red bandana that Diane used to cover the shaved parts of her head, to the puff of curly bangs covering her eyes and nose.

“I still can’t believe you shaved all your hair off!” Shelly shook her head and pulled her lips into a grimace, turning her eyes back to the road.

“Again with this?” Diane flung her head against the seat. “I have bangs, ma.”

“Well,it looks terrible.” Shelly glanced at her daughter. “You look like a freak— is that what you want? To look like a freak? Who told you to do this— Danielle?”

Shelly banged the steering wheel and stopped short, jamming her foot on the break. Everyone in the car jerked forward.

Outside, traffic on the Belt Parkway slowed to a crawl.

“All you wear is black all the time. What kind of look is that for a young girl?”

Diane rolled her eyes, but did not answer.

“Why do you want to look so hard?”

The pop beat faded, replaced by a mournful tune from an oboe. Soon, a man startedsinging in an operatic voice.

“Romania! . . . “

“Oh no!” Diane exclaimed. “This is cruel and unusual punishment!”

“…Mamaliggila, and a pastramila…”

Shelly burst out laughing and turned the volume up on the car radio again.

“Shelly!”The grandmother screamed. “Too Loud!”

As the Yiddish song played, Diane picked out a word every so often that sounded like some kind of deli meat. One song blended into the next while traffic continued to inch along the highway.

“Can we at least find something from this century?” Diane asked.

They could smell the stench of the Starret City landfill through the air vents— even with the windows up. Max kept kicking her chair. Diane stopped her tape, turned around, and eyed her little brother.

“Max! Please! Cut it out!”

Her grandmother stretched her arm out just above the little boy’s legs.

“Maximilian,that’s enough,” she whispered. Max stuck his tongue out and gave his sister araspberry.

Diane slapped her thighs. “Ugh! Why did I agree to come with you people!”

The song ended and the radio announcer spoke.

“I’m Art Raymond and you’re listening to the Sunday Morning Simcha on W-E-V-D, New York’s only Yiddish music radio station. Today we have a very special contest brought to you by our friends at Empire Chicken. If you are the twenty-fifth caller, you too can win your very own Empire Kosher Chicken— slaughtered under the strictest rabbinical supervision! So, don’t miss out. Pick up your telephone and dial 212-888-W-E-V-D.”

“Shelly,”Diane’s grandmother said while rifling through her purse. “Let’s stop at Zawn’s.I have a two-fer coupon and the chicken is thirty cents a pound. I just have to find it.”

“Oh ma – that’s a good deal! And it’s on the way.”

Diane remembered the chicken farm from their last trip out to Long Island. She stood in the rain with her cousin Melissa and Max, staring at the penned chickens running through coups, while her mother,aunt, and grandmother stocked up on poultry inside the store. Her brother tried to pet the chickens. He slipped his hand between the mesh wire fences and gotit stuck. Max screamed as Diane and Melissa tried pulling it out. The wire scratched and cut his arm while frozen shards of rainwater stung their necksand faces.

“Good grief!” Diane sighed again. “We are never getting to Marlene’s house!”

A group of children sang a jingle on the radio, “Schmerling-Schmerling, Cho-co-late-Cho-co-late.”

Diane turned her Walkman back on. Rob Halford screamed, “We Are—De-fenders- of-the-Faith!” She leaned her head against the window, closed her eyes, and prayed for an escape.

@Jimsissy 's Holiday Bash

Debs2 — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 15:18:00 GMT

Julie, or @Jimsissy as my Twitter friends know her, has decided to throw a Holiday Bash for the Twitterific writing community. I am only happy to share with all of you in this very interesting variation on Secret Santa. Please tweet @jimsissy or use #holidaybash if you have questions! Here goes:

So. The Holidays are here again. I wanted to have a huge bash and fly all of you publishing-types into town for a party. Unfortunately,the lotto people didn't cooperate so I've teamed up with a few of the twitter writers to make our party virtual. Here's what we need to do.

1. Join the party by tweeting to #holidaybash by Monday, December 7, 2009

2. Run around you house and find a white elephant gift that will fit into an envelope, put it in the envelope and get it ready to mail. You can't buy something new. Your gift can be humorous, thoughtful,strange or dramatic. The wilder, the better. (Risque is acceptable but not dirty. PG rated gifts.)

3. On Monday, we'll post who you mail your gift to. It will be your job to follow them on twitter,

get their mailing address, and send their gift.

4. Tuesday, December 8, 2009 we get our work done. Agents do agent stuff and clear your inboxes. Writers write and work on revisions.Editors, set a goal. We'll cheer you on! Authors, finish those projects.

Let's all work like crazy so we can enjoy the holidays with our families!

5. Don't open your present when it arrives!We'll open them together at the party.

6. Party time is Thursday, December 17th at 9:00PM Eastern. We'll get a chat room, open the presents, sing songs and drink the beverage of our choice ;D

In Time for Breakfast

Debs2 — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 12:21:00 GMT

Maria whisked the egg mixture inside of an old cheap bowl. She had to light the stove twice before it caught, but once it did, the flame held steady and the frying pan kicked off some heat.

The eggs sizzled as they hit the pan, sending a welcome aroma wafting through the one bedroom apartment— it was just the kind of smell she wanted her new lover to wake up to.

She sprinkled a handful of cheddar cheese into the egg. “That’s all of it,” she said to the cat that sat on the floor by her feet. “Fe-Fe, after this omelet, we are officially out of food until pay day.”

She placed two slices of bread into an old broken toaster and held the lever down, “But he’s worth it.” She liked wearing his shirt. It smelled like him.

The coffee boiled through the stove-top percolator that she liberated from her grandmother.

“Perfect.” She slid the omelet onto a plate and poured the coffee into a Christmas mug. One of her co-workers gave it to her as a secret-Santa gift. It turned out to be the only one she owned.

“Something smells good,” he said as he leaned against the kitchen doorway wearing his pants, a t-shirt, and shoes.

“Good Morning,” she leaned into him and kissed his lips.

“So that’s where my shirt went.” He pulled the shirt over her head.

“Mmm,” she replied. “I made breakfast for you, but it can wait.”

She kissed him again.

He reached for a slice of toast and popped it in his mouth as he put his shirt on.

“Don’t you want to sit down and eat?”

He pulled the toast from his mouth and started for the door.

“I’ve got to go babe,” he said with his back to her.

“What?”

He turned around, pulled a wedding band from his pocket, and slipped it on his finger.

“My wife is expecting me to come home.”

“Your wife?”

“Sorry.” They waited through a few seconds of awkward silence. “I’ll call you.”

He turned and walked out of the door, letting it slam behind him.

She stood there in her panties, holding a spatula, and started to cry.

Maria tossed the spatula into the sink and ran to the kitchen window. She saw him walk out of her building, tucking in his shirt. He crossed the street and opened the door to his red Honda Civic.

“You bastard!” She screamed into the early morning air.

He paused for a moment without turning around.

“Don’t you ever call me again!”

He got into the car and slammed the door. Tears streamed down her chin as he pulled away.

She turned around and faced the mess in her kitchen. The omelet still lay there, warm on the plate. Steam rose from coffee cup. The aroma assaulted her senses.

She knew that it might be her only meal for the next three days. Maria swallowed back her tears.

“Well, Fe-Fe— we may as well eat breakfast.”

Rainy Days and Buses

Debs2 — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 14:33:00 GMT

Diane stood on the corner of Ocean Avenue waiting for the bus in the pouring rain. A blanket of storm clouds turned the sky greenish-black and the deluge of water left a slick shimmer on the city streets.

Diane leaned over the edge of the sidewalk-- in-between the parked cars-- and scanned the oncoming traffic for any sign of a bus. The glowing stream of low-riding headlights held no promises. The Avenue L bus station did not have a shelter, only a tall street post with a sign.

Her mother forced the whole Hebrew School thing upon her after enrolling her younger brother into the day school program at East Midwood. When all her friends went to Hebrew day school for their elementary education, Diane begged her mother to send her too-- she didn't. But by now, at thirteen, Diane wanted no part of it.

Shelly promised to pick her up after the class ended at 5:00pm. Diane finished all of her homework while she waited inside the school. After about an hour, they started to lock up the building.

“Can we call someone?” asked Mrs. Brachen.

Diane felt the blood rushing to her face. “Okay.” They entered the long narrow room that looked more like a closet than the headmaster’s office. Diane picked up the receiver of the old black rotary phone, pulled each number on the dial, and waited for it to ring. Mrs. Brachen watched her with patient anticipation. Diane saw the small corner of a brown paper towel peek through the hairline of the elderly woman’s wig. The phone rang four times, five times, six times, with no answer.

“I’m sure she is on her way,” Diane explained.

“I’ll try calling my grandmother.”

She once again pulled the plastic wheel back on the phone. No one answered at her grandmother’s house either.

“I’ll just try my house one more time.”

Just like before, the line rang and rang. Diane gave up hope. She put the receiver back down and swallowed hard.

“I can wait for her outside.”

The old woman nodded and the two of them left the office. Mrs. Brachen wrapped a plastic rain hood over her head and then a scarf around her neck. She bundled up her winter overcoat and locked the little office door. She led Diane out to the back entrance— the one that let out on East 21^st Street.

“Will you be okay?” The old woman asked as Diane opened up her umbrella.

“Yes, if she doesn’t get here soon, I’ll just take the bus home.”

“Okay, have a good night,” the old woman called, waving to her as she hurried down the street.

In fact, Diane needed two city buses to get home from East Midwood and the trip took more than an hour.

She paced in front of the synagogue for about ten minutes in the pouring rain before walking around the corner to the bus stop.

Cold water seeped through her sneakers and weighed down her socks. She wished that someone she knew would pull up to the wet street corner and stop, but no one – other than her mother – drove past here. She leaned out between the parked cars again, but saw only the lights of the oncoming cars and occasional trucks up ahead. A Mercedes sedan flew by. Its passenger-side tires sunk into the large pothole next to Diane, and sprayed a puddle of muddy water all over her face and clothes.

“Ugh! Gross!” She flicked her wrist to wipe off her hand and reached into her pocket in search of a tissue. Diane fought back the tears that threatened to escape.

“I just want to go home!” She said to no one in particular.

Her little pocket tissue disintegrated as she tried to wipe the mud from her face. The strap of the backpack cut into her shoulder. She knew that the bag must weigh at least fifteen pounds with the three monster textbooks and spiral bound notebook inside of it. By now, a ring of water crawled its way up the cuffs of her jeans.

“Where the hell is the bus!”

A long black town car pulled up to the curb. She watched the tinted window slide down. The driver, a middle-aged man with a neat hair cut, wire-rimmed glasses, and a sweater with a dress shirt beneath it, leaned over.

“Need a ride?”

Diane knew better than to get into a car with a stranger, but she could feel the residual heat from inside the car seep through the window. She smelled the new leather seats and listened to the crystal clear rendition of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony playing through the front speakers.

“No thanks,” She shook her head.

“I’m not a bad guy. I promise, I just feel sorry for you standing out in the rain.”

He smiled. He looked like a kind, nice man. Hadn’t she just wished that someone would come along and offer to take her home? He drove an expensive car. Some part of her brain tried to reason that an upper middle class person could not be anything other than nice.

She looked behind him for any sign of the bus—only cars.

“Come on, you’re soaked. Just get in.”

She walked a little closer to the car and reached for the door handle.

“How far are you going?”

“I don’t want to put you out of your way.”

“It’s no trouble.” He smiled again. This time, Diane saw a glint of white from his teeth. “I’ll take you wherever you want to go.”

Something felt off. She could not decide if she would tell him where she lived. No matter how miserable the rain made her, she knew she shouldn’t get into his car. By now, any hint of daylight long since vanished and her only alternative was to wait in the cold, rainy darkness.

She released the door handle.

“You know, I think I’ll be okay,” she said as she took a step backwards. “I’m sure the bus will be here soon.”

“Don’t worry,” He said. “I’m really just a nice guy that wants to help out. The weather is horrible and my car is warm and dry.”

“N-no. I’ll wait.”

By now Diane resumed her spot on the sidewalk. She took a quick look around to see if anyone else could see the exchange. Rain pounded on the empty streets.

“Thanks anyway.”

He stared at her through the open window for a long moment before looking around.

“Are you sure?”

She nodded.

“Suit yourself.”

He rolled up the black tinted window and drove away, leaving Diane standing by herself on the corner. Another ten minutes went by before the familiar height of bus headlights gleamed through the opposite side of the red light. She jumped into the street to wave it down, praying that the driver would stop.

“It’s about damned time!” she cursed into the street.

Diane listened to familiar hiss of the buses’ brakes and watched the driver open the door.

“What happened?” she asked the driver as she flashed her bus pass. “I’ve been standing here for an hour?”

The driver glared at her but held his tongue. She squeezed into the crowded vehicle, put her backpack between her legs and grabbed the bar above a pregnant Asian woman. Water dripped from Diane’s clothes onto the woman’s legs. She cursed at Diane in Chinese.

“Sorry,”Diane mumbled. She couldn’t move in the crowded bus.

It might not be comfortable, but at least Diane knew she was going home.

Dinner

Debs2 — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 02:58:00 GMT

Diane refused to eat. She looked at the plate of macaroni and butter and pushed out her bottom lip in an exaggerated frown.

“Just take one bite,” Shelly said.

“No. I don’t want it!”

Shelly stood next to the stove holding a fork in one hand and a potholder in the other. She watched the breaded eggplant sizzle inside the cast iron pot.

The little girl jumped down from the chair and headed for the back door. Shelly pointed the fork at her.

“Don’t you dare open that door!”

Diane froze.

“Get your butt back in that seat or else.”

Diane’s face fell. She could ignore her mother’s command, but she knew all too well about Shelly’s propensity for spitefulness and considered her next move carefully.

“I don’t want it!” She stamped her bare foot onto the fake wooden floor.

“You have no choice. Now sit down, shut up, and eat your food!”

Shelly faced her frying pan again and flipped over the eggplant. Diane pouted all the way back to her chair. Diane’s plate sat within a small clearing of clutter. She could only see hints of the green marble slab that they used as a kitchen table beneath all of the crumbs, old newspapers, expired coupons, and assorted mail.

The phone rang. Shelly put down the fork and picked it up.

“Hell-o” She answered in a nasal singsong voice. “What’s doin’?”

Diane stared at her plate. She picked up a dirty fork and stabbed an elbow of pasta. It jumped. Diane crinkled up her nose and frowned. She looked out of the picture window before her at the Atlantic Ocean’s calm low tide. She wanted to run and play on the beach—to listen to the soothing sounds of waves crashing against the shore.

“Diane is giving me a hard time,” Shelly barked into the telephone. “She refuses to eat. She doesn’t clean up after herself— everything in the house is a mess—her crap is all over my living room—“ Shelly stopped complaining for a moment.

An old episode of Matlock played on the TV. Diane left her chair and flicked through the channels until she found Tom and Jerry cartoons.

Shelly held her hand over the receiver, “Don’t change it! I was watching that!”

Shelly continued her conversation. “I can’t even watch a program around here!” She paused. “Yes mom, I know, but— okay… okay mom. I’ve gotta go.” She returned the phone to its cradle on the wall.

None of the adults in her family ever ended a phone call with a salutation. They just finished speaking and hung up.

“What did I tell you about finishing your food!” Shelly screamed. “You are not getting out of that chair until you eat what’s on your plate.”

Nothing felt safe. From her earliest memories, Diane feared her mother. Her instincts told her not to trust this woman. She returned to her seat and stared at the cold and tasteless macaroni.

Once again, the little girl picked up her fork and stabbed into an elbow, this time securing it between the tines. She chewed the very al-dente macaroni while tears slid down her chin. Pushing the remaining pasta around with the fork, she fished out the softest elbows in the bunch and ate those first, leaving the crunchy ones for last.

All the while, her mother ranted through another tirade. “ . . . Nobody appreciates how hard I work to put food on this table. The least you can do is eat what I made for you!”

The smell of the frying eggplant filled the open space that contained their kitchen and living room. Shelly ate the cooling slices as she worked. “I wake up every day at four o’clock in the morning and I have to wash you, dress you and drop you off at school, and then work a full day— just to come home to aggravation.”

Diane tried to tune it out. She reached the last of the soft pasta. About five macaroni elbows remained. They still kept a dark yellow color and hardened exterior.

“Put my program back!”

The little girl got up and returned the TV channel to where she found it.

“I’m finished,” she informed her mother.

Diane picked up the paper plate and folded it into four triangles. She placed the folded plate into a plastic shopping bag that hung from a kitchen draw handle. She looked at the tray of fried eggplant that lay draining through a paper towel on the counter. It smelled much better than the macaroni. Her mother kept her back to the girl as she dunked a raw slice of eggplant into a bowl of whipped eggs.

Diane grabbed a cooked slice from the cooling plate and put it in her mouth.

Shelly reached around and took it away with an exaggerated exasperation that almost appeared comical.

“That’s for dinner!” She waved her arms up and down in a frenzy.

“Okay,” Diane muttered, but the little girl knew that within the two hours it took for her father to come home, there would be no eggplant left.

She snuck into the front hallway while her mother cooked. Diane grabbed her pink jelly water shoes and walked out barefoot. The concrete cut into the bottoms of her feet as she walked up to the street, past her neighbors’ houses, and around to the formal beach entrance. She found the gate locked, but she slipped through the hole in the fence.

Her feet sunk into the hot dry sand as she ran parallel to ocean and hid in a quiet nook between the rocks. She felt safe here – alone on the beach. She created giant sandcastles with deep moats, wore a seashell crown and carried a driftwood scepter. Magic shimmered through the mica-speckled rocks, glistened across each peak of the glimmering waves and glowed through the iridescent underbelly of the abandoned clam, oyster, and mussel shells gracing her castle entrance. She stayed there until the sky grew pink and the shadows, long.

She knew she had to go back. If her mother realized that she was gone, Shelly would get angry, scream at her for leaving, punish her—or worse. She held the little pink jellies in her hand as she waded through the sand back to the beach’s entrance, stopping to put them on by the cement. She passed her neighbor’s house, waved to the family across the street and walked up the front porch steps.

Her father called from behind.

“Hey kid-o”

She turned around as he ran his big hand down the front of her face.“You out playing on the beach?”

She nodded. He saw the sadness in her eyes – too much sadness for a little girl. He picked her up, kissed her forehead, and carried her inside. Here, in her father’s arms, she knew that everything would be okay.