101 Words

After years of loving attention, he said it was time to move on. He needed a change (as if I was rented property). This from a man in real estate, a man who hated change, still lived the same way, in the same house six years after his ex remarried. Resentment festered: anger and scorn itched for release. I waited for a dark night to visit his shady street, harbor side. Left him with a front wall of graffiti, sprayed with the frenzy and speed of a street kid on ice. Joy toggled to relief, as I felt old wounds healing.

Jake raised funds for charities, helped old neighbors shoveling snow, left groceries and gifts for the poorest family in the dilapidated house down the road. Otherwise Christmas would’ve passed by unnoticed. One day he’d raised $50,000!

Everyone said Jake would give the shirt off his back to anyone in need, but his wife, Ellen, yelled when he arrived home without the milk. His son even moped when Jake missed soccer games. He couldn’t understand.

Then came that Friday, when only his recliner remained in the living room. A one word note, ‘Goodbye.’ He crumpled to the floor.

So good. So alone.

The old woman looked half-wild: drenched and muddied, but what intrigued me was the surprisingly dry umbrella in her hand. Strange. She turned and smiled at me as if she sensed what I was thinking.

“My son gifted it to me, before he died in the war.” A shadow fell over her eyes.

“This is the only memory I have of him. I’d rather get myself drenched than let it be ruined in a heavy rain like this.”

I nodded. Deep inside my bag lay a broken watch. I recalled a similar conversation with my son after his father passed.

The vast gray regolith is like a virgin canvas, ready for the artist. It has been preparing for this moment for a long time. Bearing the asteroid impacts and enduring the space radiations.

I take a moment to savor the serene landscape. Up in the dark sky, the blue marble gazes lovingly. Hoping for a masterpiece that the future generations will ultimately deliver.

Beyond, many more globes await. Cold and distant, hot and gassy. Patient for their turn in the colossal scheme of the things.

I descend slowly and put my left foot down. The land sighs. And the artwork begins.

The man in the boat heard the airplane before he saw it swooping down toward him. Yrroomm! It dipped and banked, dangerously close to the boat. It climbed, arced, and swooped again. Yrroomm!

The man could only watch, helpless against the mad pilot.

Psshh! The red twin-engine careened into the water, creating a wave that upended the boat and sent the man afloat, face down, bobbing away from his craft.

As if guided by the hand of God, the plane rose from the sea and climbed, its wake dousing a nearby duck.

“Okay, Aiden, time to get out of the tub.”

One person cut a scar, a vertical one, slashing straight down. Not on the skin where it’s visible, but inside, branded in the mind.

Others added additional scars, a horizontal line starting from the first, and another one below it following the same track—an F. Then, beside that, a vertical and a horizontal, the letter L.

So it went, for years, more letters forming, until the whole message emerged: FLY SOLO. STEER CLEAR OF SOCIETY, BE CAREFUL AROUND PEOPLE.

Should they ask why I do so, or criticize my solitude, I’ll point to the message and say: You wrote that.