101 Words

“Look, honey, Grandma sent you a birthday card. Want me to read it to you?”

She slipped the bills out of the card and into her pocket as she walked down the hall, waving the colorful card around. Tomorrow, after her husband headed to work and she’d done the school drop off, she’d call her mother and confess.

“Yay, Grandma! Look, Mommy, it has a puppy on the front.”

“Put your card in your room and go get your shoes. We’re going to the grocery store.”

“Can I have candy?”

Calculations flew through her mind. Pasta. Meat. Jar of sauce.

“Sure.”

I dump the rice out and begin measuring again. I need to be sure all of her will fit inside the brass belly of the urn I imported from India. Reassuring myself that she’ll fit, I pour the rice out and begin scooping for real. Five heaping cups is the sum total of her golden life.

I screw the lid on tight and ask her if she’s ready to go for a ride. My heart sinks at the silence, but I grab the leash and her favorite rubber chicken anyway as we head out the door toward the open road ahead.

Walking back from the hospital, where the news had not been good, he encountered his old buddy from the sixties whom he hadn’t seen in forty years. In fact, he thought that he remembered having read his obituary. As they reminisced, he found himself confiding that he would give the rest of his life for another day in 1965.

Later, hearing the distinctive opening bars of ‘Like A Rolling Stone’ coming from a shop he was passing, he saw, in the shop window reflection, a man looking back at him wearing a pink paisley shirt, bell-bottom hipsters, and Cuban heeled boots.

With a three-beer buzz and the bass thumping I feel invincible. I lock eyes with the beauty at the bar, and we swap a smile and the smile is wanton. In an instant I see seduction, love, bliss. I rise from my seat and stride indestructibly towards her.

Our eyes meet again and she leans to whisper something into her friend’s ear without breaking eye contact with me. The whisper is dangerous. She smiles again and the smile feels mocking. In an instant I see rejection, humiliation, despair. My indestructibility shatters and I slink past. Perhaps a four-beer buzz is needed.

The clock was ticking. Situation: critical. Red or blue? Bill asked himself.

In the movies, the red cable always deactivates the bomb. But this is real life, Bill. Your choice is vital. Think! Fast!

His hands trembled. Sweat snaked down his back as he desperately analysed the alternatives. Which is the safest? Red? Blue? I need to get out fast. Maybe red…

“Red!” he snapped.

“Well…yeah, I agree; the red dress does look better. Fine, I’ll buy that one,” his partner said calmly after two hours trying on dresses. “Wanna shop for your new watch now?”

“Maybe tomorrow, darling.”

Sopdet lies in the heart of the Great Pyramid, dreaming of worlds beyond earth, the surrounding belt of rocks and dust, and onwards to the constellation Usir. The star shafts transmit her thoughts and dreams, signaling completion of the pyramid complex.

The jackal-headed messenger acknowledges receipt: “You have proven worthy, sentinel. Are you prepared to initiate the program?” Sopdet offers silent assent.

It will take millennia, but the gods, heralded by the three shrines’ alignment, would return to the house of Geb triumphant.

And they would seize this planet from the pyramid builders and enslave them to the gods once more.

My anxiety increases as the train draws closer to the border. Our compartment is nearly empty. Just two of us now.

The woman in the seat facing me asks in heavy-accented English if I’m crossing on the train. I butcher the pronunciation of the final destination and apologize for ignorance of her language. My voice betrays my fear of debarking in a strange city at night.

Her name is Alena. Sensing my uneasiness, she offers to steer me through the arrival procedures. With the stress of aloneness relieved, I soon doze.

When I awake, both Alena and my passport are gone.