Humans Crack Me Up

I go to the zoo.  My friends and I discuss pranks we should play on the zookeepers.  We come up with a brilliant plan to waltz up to a zoo keeper and humbly and modestly inform her that the monkeys are naked.  We think this is hilarious and I volunteer for the job.
Giggling and pulling out their phones to take videos, my friends nudge me and motion to the employee slumped against the wall of the monkey exhibit.  I nod and give them the okay, creeping over to the young lady in a theatrically nervous, slightly embarrassed manner.
I cough, "Um, excuse me, but-um...The monkey's are naked."
Employee stares at me, expression as blank as her glasses.  "You think your funny?"
Darn.  She's one of those people.
"Heh," I shrug, continuing the act, "Just didn't know if-you know-that was a problem or not..."
Now she's showing some expression.  I should wrap it up before I get strangled.

Two hours later my friend comes up to me and dares me to start dancing in front of the crowed to win a free funnel cake.  So I do.  Of course.  (If you'd like to call it dancing).
And the man at the snack bar gives us a free funnel cake....
And I'm like,

How am I supposed to learn my learn my lessons? 

Humans crack me up.  I love seeing their reactions to things.  Analyzing their characters.  One of my favorite things to do is watch people.  Which is terribly rude and creepy and socially unacceptable and I wouldn't suggest it.  But really, people are fascinating.  

I thought I was good at people's characters.  I write them out like maps, like equations in my head, and then they do things completely unexpected, and I erase all my notes and wonder what I did wrong.  People are kind of like science, I'm bad at it. 

I've done a lot of dumb things this year.  It's been quite entertaining.  I mean, I don't have Netflix.  I have to actually physically entertain myself.

Ooh, ooh, how about this one:

Me:  "Hey Mom, you can drop me off at the cafe, I'll just walk to the library for filming."

Mom:  "You sure?  You wont have much time."
Me:  "Pffff, sure I have time!  It's right across the street!"

😐

Well.  After a lovely cup of coffee and chat with the employees and a mad rush to memorize lines, I look at my watch and realize I'm already late.  I rush out the door, a lovely neon green sign in front of me that says, 'Library' with a little stick figure reading a book.  And I walk left...

I eventually come back to my senses (or, what ever sense I am capable to attain), cursing myself and looking for a rock to smash my head on.

People laugh when I tell them that my natural humanly sense of navigation is broken.  Then I tell them this story and they stop laughing.

Then there was the time I was volunteering at a concert at a booth selling band swag, whom for the moment I had to pretend I liked.  After the concert, I start stacking chairs.  No, volunteering and stacking chairs does not mean I am a virtuous person.  But I suppose you've already gathered that.

The fancy car pulls up beside us as we work, containing two men with lovely hair, stern expressions and sunglasses.

"That's them!  Form the concert!" My friends exclaim, taking turns peeking over the chair stacks to take a look at the celebrities.  "Ha!" Say's me, in all my jealousy and arrogance, "They think they're so cool!  They're rich they can afford a fancy car with fancy sunglasses and phones and black jackets just so they can look like super undercover spy dudes!  Look them!  Just to impress the chicks!  Ha!  I bet they-"

That's when I shut up.  Oh, I would have continued.  I was pumped.  Until I realize that during my entire sass rage, their window was rolled down...

Yes, I've been pretty top notch stupid this year.  Then there was that time my friend and I dressed up in fluffy princess dresses and flounced around Walmart...I'm not even going to go into that.  Perhaps another day in the Adventures of Dr. Elemis Pott and How She Entertains Herself.  Within the last few days I've managed to accidentally walk down the men's hall, wonder why a friend hadn't arrived after I already greeted them and they stood not a foot away from me, almost get clobbered if not for someone shoving me back in line, (this is all within three minutes of a day mind you) run into Captain America and spill coffee all over her, forget three pages of a script and an entire scene I was supposed to perform that day, I forgot my pants, (not even kidding) forgot my watch, my food, my age, and I chugged almost an entire bowl of orange punch, straight from the bowl.  And that's only within a few days.  Oh but there's more.
On fourth of July I set my backyard on fire, and hours later, set off illegal fire works.  The cops showed up.  But all that wasn't entirely my fault.  Then I proceeded to sing classic patriotic songs around the camp fire.  Like, "You'll Be Back" from Hamilton, and "Taylor the Latte Boy."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fdxLohjwhoQ

(You'll Be Back.  A song written in the POV of Kind George as a 'Love' Song to America).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zXS0nEOx_20

(Taylor the Latte Boy....yeah..)

Oooooh and so much more.  If I had time and energy and no life then I could continue.  It would never end.  Which makes me sad because I know I'm forgetting something juicy that will torment me for not writing about.  But it's a burden that children like me have to bare.

Make it A Story Challenge: By MMC (My Mutant Cousin)

No, my cousin is not mutant.  On the contrary she is quite normal (in a good sense), peaceful, beautiful, loving, and wise.  Which makes her hidden ninja side even scarier....

Thank you so much for your incredible stories MMC!  (And sorry.  I'll come up with a better nick name for you...)

If you don't know what the Make it a Story Challenge is, go back a four blog posts and read about how it works.  I'd love to hear your stories!

Monster Stories, by MMC

Cory carried monsters.
He held his green-and-orange backpack in front of him, trying to rush out the door before his parents could notice that it was wiggling. Snap – or Sneak – let out a muffled growl.
“Cory? Did you need that waiver today?”
Cory leaned his head back into the house. “Augh-awhat?” he yelled, to cover the sound of another growl.
“For the natural history museum,” his mom replied patiently.
“Nope Mom it’s oooooo-kay!” Cory called, stifling a yelp as a sharp tail poked him through the backpack. “I’ll just get it in tomorrow!”
“Your trip is today.”
“That’s-fine-actually-Dad-got-it-bye!”
Cory ran out of the house. On the bus, he forged a signature onto the waiver.
While the noisy class sat in the dark space section of the museum, Cory snuck away to the “Prehistoric Oceans” display. He knelt and peeked under the display platform.
Yellow eyes winked at him.
Cory opened his backpack. Snap and Squeak untangled themselves, and stared up with the same yellow eyes.
Cory hugged them, bristly scales and all, then pushed them under the display. Happy squeals came from under the platform. He thought he could recognize Sneak’s.
He turned to go. His face felt hot, and his eyes filled with tears.
A tall green monster stopped him, and held out a hand.
Cory shook it.

Lyssa searched for monsters.
The lone lantern on the bow of her gondola gave weak light to the canal. She gave a clumsy stoke with her oar, and warm water splashed her bare arms. Her purple dress might be wet too, soon.
Uppity restaurants lined the canal, outdoor porches and tables twinkling with lights. Businesspeople chatted and sipped wine. But here in the middle of the canal, the music and chatter dimmed.
Lyssa should be back at the legal party, smiling, chatting, making connections in her new career. Only children believed in monsters.
She paddled slowly to the canal light where two waterways intersected. No one else was out here – no humans, at least.
She had been chatting with a young lawyer at the party, leaning on a rail by the water. He had complimented her work on the last case, and she had looked down, pleased but embarrassed.
Yellow eyes had winked in the water.
Lyssa stopped paddling in the intersection and scanned the canals. She was too old for this. But those eyes had called up half-forgotten memories – or fantasies? Yellow eyes. A scaly tail. A feathered face and curious fuzzy nose.
Fantasy. The overactive imagination of a lonely child. Lyssa was past that now.
She bowed her head.
And something splashed behind her.
It jumped into the boat – yellow, curious eyes – and nuzzled into her lap.

Sophie played with monsters.
She told Kent that when he came to play during the parents meeting, and he said that his brother said that monsters aren’t real. But his brother was wrong then, because but they ARE. REAL.
Sophie told Kent that, but he said no, his brother is ALWAYS right.
Sophie didn’t want to play with Kent after that. Which is why it was okay to be in time-out for yelling. Kent was stupid anyway. Sophie WANTED to be in time out.
Except she yelled that, too, and kicked at the bed, which got her in more trouble.
But the really bad part was after the meeting, when she had sat there and calmed down and even said sorry to Kent. Kent left, and Sophie started to get happy again, because time-out was over and there were extra peanut-butter cookies from the adults. But then the parents had said no, don’t go outside yet, sit here and we can talk while you eat your cookie.
Then they said that monsters weren’t really real.
Sophie took her cookie and ran outside after that. She sat on the dock by the canal and cried.
Yellow and Yellow Two came first, sitting by her with their stripy feet and looking at her with big eyes.
Big Tooth nuzzled her with his fuzzy head.
The fish monsters poked their heads out of the water and waited.
Finally, Sophie slowed down her crying and broke up her cookie to share.
She played with her monsters till the sun went down.

Mattie wrote for monsters.
She sat backstage, because she did scene changes for the play, and wrote the story in her head.
She had been sitting on a tall stool, reading a book while the main swordfight scene went on. It was a long scene about an evil dragon. The book she was reading was about an invasion of alien lizards.
That was when Mattie thought – what if there were good monsters?
Mattie imagined the story. The sword-woman in her cloak – the sword-woman was Mattie, now – would be fighting an evil dragon with red scales and dirty teeth. She would be fighting bravely, but then she would trip and fall.
And that was when the good monsters would come.
They would be green and scaly, with yellow glowing eyes, and they would climb over the dragon and attack it with their teeth.
Mattie could imagine them the clearest. After the monsters had helped Mattie the sword-woman to kill the dragon and save a couple mountain towns from total destruction, they would stay with her for a while.
Their skin was rough and scaly, but they had round, curious eyes, and they would never hurt her.
Making up the monsters felt more and more like remembering them.

Anna fished for monsters.
Her mom said not to go too close to the canals, but Anna was older now. Old enough to finish school, soon. Old enough to know that her grandma’s old stories, of green, scaly monsters who liked peanuts, were just stories. Old enough to know that the canals were dangerous now.
But Anna still wondered.
So she covered a hook in peanut butter and snuck out to Old Town. There used to be restaurants here, but now they were musty old gift shops.
Behind one was a canal intersection, with an almost-drowned canal light in the center.
Anna swam to the light with her fishing pole and climbed up. She dangled the hook into the water.
Anna imagined her grandmother here, years ago, in a wooden gondola. The water was probably lower then.
Anna wondered if she should be scared. Probably not. If there were still monsters here, they would be out at night, like in Grandma’s stories. Her mind wandered as she sat there in the sun.
She heard a quiet splash and looked down.
Her fishing line jerked, and her pole flew out of her hands and disappeared.
She thought she heard a gulp, muffled by the water.
A yellow eye the size of a plate emerged from the surface.
It winked.

Janika lived with monsters.
Some people worshipped them. When an ocean-lizard raised its great head, they prayed to it. When a rumble-hill opened a grassy eye, they sang special songs.
Some people feared them. Janika’s grandparents built their house on a stone plateau, far from rumble-hills and pesky earth-diggers.
But Janika thought the monsters were just animals, like dogs or parrots. Like all of God’s creatures, just – bigger.
She didn’t worship them. You don’t worship dogs, you worship God for giving them to you.
She didn’t fear them, either. The rumble-hills were huge, yes, but they never crushed anyone. They just looked at you patiently, and if they moved that did it at the pace of a snail.
She’d even seen an ocean-lizard, once. She had gone to the docks with other tourists to throw peanut-packages into the water, and it ate her package and winked a giant yellow eye. Her little brother squealed and hid behind her leg, but Janika thought it was a friendly wink. She read stories about when the monsters had been smaller, and they never hurt people then. They played with children.
That was why Janika decided that when she grew up, she would live on a rumble-hill.
One hill, in particular. It stayed close to Janika’s house, in a little valley across the road. She named it Grain, for the wheat that sometimes grew on it. She built herself a swing on Grain’s tree, and when she played on him, his deep rumbles sounded happy.
Janika’s friends said she was crazy, but she just smiled and read her stories of monsters.

The Steam Punk Wizard of Oz

I've never actually done a legit advertisement before.  As in, none boy-friend-seeking.  Today marks my first post of a real honest advertisement.

  The Steam Punk Wizard of Oz

This Saturday, July 1st, at 3:00pm.  Doors open at 2:30pm.

Admission is free!

At the Nazarene Church in Woodland Park 
Staring the Captain America/the Pizza Angle as Dorothy, I as the Scare Crow, And Squimp as everyone else.........Almost everyone else....And many other fantastic actors!!!

There will be donation tables with snacks, desserts and refreshments.  All donations will go to the local Food Pantry.

Contact me or leave a comment if you have any questions.

"You will come."

The Wait

The Wait 

Call it crumbling 

Call it lust 

Our lives are tumbling
Are we not dust?

Is it time for me

To stop having fun?

Do my friends really care?

Are the good days done?

When the affection fades,

Am I alone?

Did I dance the masquerade,

So my feelings never shown?

A cross on a chain,
And church once a week,

To mask our pain,

Though it's not God we seek.

Give me an answer!

Where is my life?

Being eaten by cancer.

Chipped away by a knife.

Why the temptation?

Am I a human mistake?

You promised salvation,

Then why do I feel so fake?

You've given me passion,

But why not success?

I'm tired of waiting.

I'm done with this mess.

Stop.

Look around.
Turn away from the mirror.

See.

Hear the sound,

Of the hope that's coming nearer.

I never left you.

I never forgot.

My love for you is deeper

Then you have ever sought.

You can't have dark

Without the light.

You can't have ugly

Without the right.

The night is fading,

The dark wont last.

There's beauty in the waiting.
I'm here.  Hold on fast.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H0NOxf4uaZI

(NF, Oh Lord)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kc7orBfhEmk

(John Waller, While I'm Waiting)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MUWbmtbzDno

(Casting Crowns, Praise You in this Storm)

Dear Loki, From Your Human...

Dear Loki,

Hi.  It's me.
At the end of things, for some reason it seems timely to go back to the beginning.   So here we go.

Honestly the thought of getting another cat wasn't as happy a feeling as it should have been, so soon after my dear Mulligan left the building.  I didn't happen to be in a very cheerful state of mind to begin with.  

Mom and I walked in surrounded by fluffy-frue-frue-kittens, performing their normal fluffy-frue-frue-kittenish routines.  Stumbling around on tiny, stubby little kitten legs, squeaking their high pitched mews, snuggle each other, etc.
Not you.

You weren't a fluffy-frue-frue-good feeling kitten.  You were skinny and gray, with green eyes too big for your triangle face.  When I walked in, it was as if something inside of you snapped.  You screamed at me.  I'm not sure how many people have been screamed at by a cat.  It was as if you were on a caffeine high.  As if your life was at stake.  And it might have been. You banged your head against the gate, reached through the bars as far as your skinny little teen-aged-kitten arms could extend, your toes separated.  The innocent kitten below your cage mewed at me, and you reached under and smacked him in the face with your paw.
And I fell helplessly in love with you.

But Mom and I considered another kitten before you.  Sorry to hurt your feelings, but to put quite frankly, he was much cuter then you.  I watched the personality-less ball of kitten stumble aimlessly about the room.  I watched him with equal blankness.   And I could still hear you screaming form the other room.

It broke me.

I asked if we could check you out.  Mom mentioned your being a little older then what she was hoping for, but agreed. You were freed from your cage.  It was like the scene in West Side Story when the two love interests see each other.  Only more hyper, and we didn't start singing.
Mom was on the phone in the other room.
Mom:  "Yes, I think we found a kitten.  She's a little fluffy white kitten..."
*Mom looks through the window at me and you, clinging to each other and staring at her wide eyed.*
Mom:  "...Okay never mind I think we're getting a different one..."

The next day we took you home.
We named you Loki.

Me and Loki's Band Photo

You got settled in.  Ate food.  You grew large and squishy.  You became so calm and chill that we started calling you 'Low-key'.  (Pun intended)  We could dance with you about the house, carrying you like a baby and spinning you around, and you wouldn't care.  You'd just stare at us with half closed eyes, blinking slowly.  Your silence spoke all the sarcasm for you.
Then we brought your little punk brat baby brother home.

Wallace (The Flame/Wonder Boy)

Loki:  "Really?"

Loki Pretending Not to Enjoy This 

God has funny methods of answering one's prayers.  God gave me you to help drag me from my emotional, nightmare-ish like state.   You were there for me.  Like a friend.  Can cat's be friends?  Maybe for Disney princesses.  Or over emotional little girls in the basement.  

Thank you for helping me feel less lonely.  Thank you for being my little friend.  Thank you for letting me hug you like a teddy bear throughout the night and talk to you like a journal.  Thank you for loving bubbles so much.  I kept a container of bubbles by my bed just for you, just because I loved seeing you catch them.

I remember our last conversation.  You had been getting outside more.  We couldn't keep you inside.  At this time in the day, you laid in your favorite spot on your tower, the highest point, and I came up to you and gave you hugs and kisses, stroking your now dusty, gritty fur.  As I pet you I realized you had gotten much skinnier.  It almost made me sad.  Then I just stood there.  Petting you and talking to you for a long time. I asked you why you had to like the out doors so much.  I told you how much I loved you, how much I needed you, and that we made a pretty great team.

Then you disappeared.  I felt sick.  Wallace wondered about the house with me, mewing, rubbing against my feet where ever I went.  I know he can seem like a heartless little punk, but you know he loves you.  
After having to say goodbye to some very dear friends, I returned home to find out I had yet another friend I had to say goodbye to.  You were killed.  My family found you and buried you while I was gone.  

I still think I didn't get enough time with you.  It was too short.  I'm wrong.  It was perfect.  God gave us the perfect time.  And he even let us say good bye to each other.  I couldn't ask for more.
I went to your grave this evening, in the back the forest.  It's summer now, which is perfect because I got to pick you some flowers on the way.  I sang a few parting songs.  And blew bubbles for you.

Loki, you're beautiful and perfect, and  love you so much.

Your friend the human, 

Dr. Elemis Pott 

Songs to Loki:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q8ir8rVl2Z4

(Last Goodbye)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RgKAFK5djSk

(When I see you Again)

Make it a Story Challenge

Dear Writers/People That Like Thinking,
I have a challenge for you.  Here are the requirements.
You have to be:
1. Willing to write
2. Willing to think
3. Willing to realize that this is a very useful and important waste of you time.  (What else is a blog for?)

Here is the challenge:

1.  Look at these picture's, and make a story out them.
2.  Make up a story for each of them.
3.  Each story has to be related to the other pictures in someway.  (Example:  They can all be in the same world, they can all have the same main character, etc.  Be creative.)
4.  Each story can only be two paragraphs long.  (But I'm not apposed to you turning it into a series of 500 page novels when your done with this challenge).

5.  When you are done, you may email/google message me your finished work and I will post it on my blog.  Or let me know if you don't want your writing posted.  Or you can be lame and do the challenge and not send me anything.  That works too, I guess.

6.  You can write in what ever style you want.  Even poetry.  (If that's the case then use your own better judgement when it comes to the paragraph rule).  

Reward:

A glomp.  

Definition:  Something between a hug and a tackle.........I can think of no better reward at the moment.

Here are the pictures:

                                                                                   Picture One

                                                                              

                                                                                         Picture Two

Picture Three

Picture Four

Picture Five

Picture Six 

Have fun.

Call It Red

Here is a short story I wrote in the car.
(Warning, I'm rating it PG13.  So if you're sensitive to that sort of thing, or simply don't feel like reading anything dark, then I suggest you don't read this).

Call It Red

The straps on my shoes are red.  The advertisements are bright and red.  Seems like each one that passes by looks brighter and sillier then the next.  The grass between the roads and buildings is dark green.  Each building structure is intricate, decorative, colorful…joyful.  Every person we pass is smiling.  Their clothes don’t very much in style, only in color.  So many colors.  And the color red.
I turn and look at Mama.  She sits next to me, reading from her book screen.  The light reflects in her half closed eyes.  Her lips are red.  Stretched into a smile.  Always smiling.  When I smile for too long my cheeks go numb.  But Mama smiles like her face was sewn that way.   Like how a shirt is pulled tight and hung by two clothespins, Mama’s smile seems stretched and pined to her face.
Maybe it has something to do with her face enhancement surgeries.  I wonder what people look like without face enhancement surgeries, maybe they turn into ugly animal creatures.
I thought the color red was equal to the amount of any other color in the city.  In the world.  But I was wrong.  I’ve seen red.  Real, deep, dark, thick, warm red.  A lot of it.  Just hiding inside us where no one can see.
 try to imagine all the red in side of Mama.  I can’t.  her skin is too tight, smooth, pink, untouched.  Unscratched.
Mama must sense I’m looking at her because her head tilts towards me, “Hay sweaty, don’t forget to smile, okay?”
She gives my chin a stroke, her fingers warm minus the cold metal of her ring.
I look out the window again.  A billboard high above flashes a picture or the widest and brightest smiles a face could possibly hold, with the only word I can read below, ‘’smiling.”
I slouch deeper in my seat buckles, keeping my head back and hoping no one out side see’s me not smiling.  There’s a tray of untouched crackers in front of me.  My stomach refused them.  I look at Mama’s stomach, her seat belt hugging the little round problem.  The problem that seems to grow larger and larger every day.  That’s what Mama and Daddy call it.  Yet they keep smiling.
“Mama?”
She doesn’t respond, so I say it louder, above the hum of the engine and air conditioning.
“Mama?”
She hums, her dimples deepening, but she doesn’t look up from her screen.  This is how I know she’s not going to answer my questions, but I ask any way.
“What’s the problem for?”
“Hm?  What problem?”  Her voice is high with concern, though her expression is still as a pond.
“The problem in your stomach.”
“Oh,” She laughs, looking under her screen at her stomach, “You mean, what is the problem?”
“What is the problem?”
“Well, it’s not really a problem—the doctors will take care of it in two seconds.  But they have a nice play room for you and probably a movie, it’ll be fun.”
I predicted I would get an answer kind of like that.  Usually I quit here, knowing I wont get anywhere, but there’s a hurtful flicking in my chest, telling me that I will never be at peace until I understand.
But I can’t.  I never understand anything.  In the moments where I think I understand, someone informs me that I really don’t.
For me to understand would be like trying to fill up a dried ocean with a garden hose. 
“Mama?”  I try again.
“Hm?”
“What’s inside you?”
She takes a breathe through her nostrils, “Well, it’s like an egg, or a lump that needs to come out.”
“Which is where I came from.”
“What you…” She looks at me, “Oh, yes!  Uh-huh, you’re right.” She grins deeper and bows back to her screen.
“So who’s inside you right now?”
“You mean what’s inside me right now?  I already told you.  Keep smiling, honey.”  She raises her eye brows at me to emphasize  the order.
I stretch the corners of my mouth slightly, and look at the empty seat beside me, the one closest to the window.  The loose seat belt.  Every time I look I think I’ll see her sitting there, short brown hair in her face and pointed nose.  Her skinny knee caps protruding from a pair of shorts.  But she’s not there.  She’s never there anymore, she’s nowhere.
I’ve looked for her everywhere.  In her room.  Every corner of the house.  In the back yard.  Out the window on drives, in case I might see her on the side walks.
Mama and Daddy keep telling me she’s moved away.  But they wont tell me where.  I’ve looked everywhere.  Maybe they don’t know.  Even though they know everything.
The steering wheal turns automatically, and the auto control voice says, like a happy melody, “We are 5 minutes from the Joy4all Hospital.”
“Is Phoebe there?” I ask.
Mom pupils stop twitching.  Her eyes still glow with the screen light, but she’s not reading.  It’s as though time paused. “No, she moved away, remember?” 
“Like how Grandma moved away?”
“Yeah,” She whispers, squinting me a quick smile.
She keeps turning back to her book.  Maybe she’s just speaking and not listening. 
“But that’s where they took Phoebe,” I proceed, “Maybe she’s still there.”
“No, she’s not.  She moved on.”
“Maybe she didn’t, and you just don’t know.”
“No, Tom, she’s not.”
“Maybe they cleaned her so she’s not red any more.”
“No.”
No.  It’s so short and robotic sounding from Mama.  I look away and suck the inside of my cheek.
Mama and Daddy always seem to have answers for every question I have.  That’s how I know they know everything.  And I’m wrong.  Always.  And now my mind drifts out into dangerous, unknown seas.  I know what I’m thinking, but I’m so afraid that my thoughts will be loud enough for Mama will hear.
I’m the last one that saw Phoebe.  Not Mama.  Not Daddy.  Me.
I look at the empty seat.  I see her.  She watches me.
Maybe Mama and Daddy really don’t know where she is.  Maybe I’m the one that knows where she is.  Then I should tell them.
I can’t.
I shouldn’t even be thinking about this.  It’s bad for my positivity, whatever that means.  Mama might have me go to Mrs. Prig’s office for a disciplinary talking to.  I hate those.
Phoebe still watches me from the empty seat. 
I’ve come so far.  The excitement of treading these dangerous waters is too much.  What would happen?
I open my mouth.
“Phoebe died.”
Mama’s head jerks up, I’ve never noticed Mama had so much white in her eyes.  I open my mouth again.
“I killed Phoebe.”
Her red lips pull together, there are winkled lines on her mouth.  Without the smile, she looks like a different human.  My tongue is stiff.  I don’t breathe.
“Who taught you to say that?”
“No one.”
“Tom,” Her voice is slow and peaceful, “No one…’Dies.”  Her eye lid twitches, she licks her lips, as if cleansing them from using such a word.
No one dies.
“That’s what I told Phoebe.”
Mama doesn’t answer right away.  In fact, there is silence after my words.  Just the hum of the car and the hiss of cars passing us.  The silence is wrong.  I need to fill it, but there’s nothing else to say.  I just wait.
Mama scratches her twitching eye lid with the tip of her finger nail, her face slowly regains it’s normal composure and she says, “I’m sorry you feel a little sad that Phoebe isn’t here, but we have to remember to say happy things, and smile, it’ll make it better.  Okay, sweetie?”
The car slows down, turning into a large parking lot.  Ahead there is a monstrous white building, stretched as wide as a forest so tall I have to duck to see the top through my window.  It get’s smaller and smaller at the top, like stairs meeting each other. 
“Welcome to Joy4all hospital,” says the car.  Our seat belts and the door’s unlock with a simultaneous; ‘click.’
Mama’s book goes back and she tucks it in her purse, throwing the strap over her shoulder.  She opens the door and steps out.  Normally I’d follow her.  I don’t.  I sit heavy and still, like there’s a brick in my chest.  It hurts.  I let my jaws pull tight together and my face go hard and scrunched ‘till it’s warm.
“Come on Tom.” Mom motions to me.
“I hate smiling.”
“Tom!”  Mom ducks into the car, her purse dangling from her arm, “Where did you hear those words?” As she reaches for my arm, she holds her stomach with the other.
“Who’s in your stomach?”
Her eye lashes flicker, masking an eye roll, “What’s inside my stomach, and I already told you.  It’s time to go.”
 She pulls my arm.
“I came from your stomach,” I say.
“Yes, very good, and we have to go now-”
“Phoebe came from your stomach.”
She pinches my knee.  It doesn’t’ hurt, but the sharp movements makes me jolt.  “Tom,” Her eyes look straight into mine, “I don’t want to be late.  Don’t make me call Daddy to tell you to get out of the car.”
I let her take my arm and guide me out.  I watch the ground, my legs heavy and slow.

We approach the glass entrance.  Pictures of smiling people line the windows.  The sunset behind them.  Some fancy words underneath.
As Mama and I push through the pinning glass doors, she whispers, “Smile.”  Her face back to grinning.  And she doesn’t look down at me.
The inside of the building is so wide, with so many people and shiny tile.  I see the reflection of my shoes as we walk.  There are sections of blue chairs, plenty of people and screens.  So much light and color.
Mama guides me down the long expanse, to a hallway with elevators.  There’s a slight ease of weight inside me.  I like elevators. 
The glass doors slide open and we step in, Mama tells the voice monitor what floor we’re going to.
Phoebe and I used to jump in the elevator, to see if we could make them go down.  I watch my shoes.  I didn’t even ask to press the buttons.
We go up, but my insides sink.
I come to a realization.  Something happened to me that I was unaware of.  I don’t like elevators any more.
The round lights above the door change slowly to the right, as the floors pass us under us.
It’s so quiet.  Just the two of us.  No, three of us.  I look at the tiny, barely noticeable bulge in Mama’s stomach.

Don’t be scared  Phoebe, there’s no such thing as death.

There’s another Phoebe.  A Little Phoebe.  Right here.  So close, yet invisible.  So small, in the dark.  Unknowing.  Like she was.  I wonder if Little Phoebe could have as much red in her as my Phoebe.  My arms shake.  I can’t make it stop.
We’re almost at our floor.
“Mama?”
“Hm?”
“Is she a boy or a girl?”
Her lips part, still smiling, though veins appear in squiggled bulges on the side of her forehead, “It’s a blob of matter, Tom.  Am I not explaining well enough?”
The elevator slows, my stomach flutters.  I used to laugh at the feeling.  Now I want to puke.  The doors slide open.
We enter into the noise and voices again, and a room identical to the one we first entered, as though we never moved.  Even the people look the same.  Mom holds my wrist as we walk.  Nurses in bright baggy shirts smile at us when we pass.  Especially at me.   Even some of their shirts have smiley faces on them.
Everything seems to stare at me.  The only one not smiling one.  I’m surrounded.  Figures in obscurely painted masks, they cornering me, the plastic of their smiles grow wider and wider, as though they’ll swallow me.  No where to hide.  No where to run.
And I never noticed.  I wish I could go back to not noticing. 
My legs slow down, forcing Mom to grab my wrist tighter and pull harder.  My shoes squeak on the tile.
We stop before the desk screen.  She doesn’t let go of my wrist, and I don’t stop pulling back. 
“Mama, is she a boy or a girl?”
“Tom, please,” Mama articulates, “I wish you wouldn’t be so difficult.  There’s a fun room for you so you can-”
I’m not listening any more.  There’s a lady sitting in a chair behind us with bright, died red hair.  Her glasses are red.  There’s a man in the seat facing her with a red notebook binder.  In the vending machine behind him contains some kind of red energy liquid.  The nails of the girl who slips her coins in the machine are red.  Her jacket is red.
It’s all the wrong kind of red though.  I look at my shoes.  What was it?  I don’t remember…
“Blood!”
Mama’s shoulders tense, her bangs fall in her face and she bends down to me, “Where?!  Are you okay?”
“It’s called blood.”
She puts a finger to her lips, glancing around, her voice is hissing and sharp, “Sssh, don’t ever say things like that!  Especially here!” 
“I know what blood is-”
“Tom,”
“It’s inside you and when your skin opens up-”
“Tom—ssssh-”
“That’s what comes out.”
“Stop.”
But I don’t stop.  I can’t now. 
“And it’s dark and warm and red and it’s everywhere Mama!  It’s on that truck and all over the road because I killed-”
“Stop!”  Mama has my shoulders, tight, her teeth are bared, “Stop it, stop it, stop it!”
She closes her eyes and exhales, her breathe warm and minty.  Taking my sore arm, she stands, clicks a few more rapid taps into the screen and pulls me down the hall with her.  A few people glance at us as we pass, Mama just smiles back.  She takes me around a bend with a water bottle dispenser.  I still hear voices, but they are distant and the hall is narrower and empty.  Mama faces me, bending down to one knee and looking me in the eyes, taking my hands in her thin, warm ones.
“Tom, I can’t believe you would say those words.  I think you owe me an apology.”
“Phoebe died.”  My throat constricts, and I can’t fight the tingling in my nose and heat that rushes to my face and eyes.  Mama’s lips part.  Her eyes look up, not at the ceiling, not at anything really, just not at me.  Something happens to her eyes.  They’re shiny.  Like wet, newly cleaned glass. 
“Tom, there’s no such thing as dying.”  She whispers.
“But I saw it.  I killed Phoebe.”
“There’s no such thing as killing.” The lump on her throat moves up and down, I hear the wet swallow and she looks at me, the smile returns, “You can say; taking away, or leaving, and that happens.  But you know what?  It’s okay.”  She strokes my hair, her hands clammy against the moist my forehead.
“We don’t have to be sad about it, because there’s so reason to be sad.  People leave, and sometimes it’s necessary.”
“But it’s wrong.”
Mama shakes her head, her bangs slip back in her face and she tucks them behind her ear. “Don’t say wrong.  We all make our own choices, and if it’s right to them then it’s right.  There’s no wrong.”
I don’t understand.  If there’s no wrong, then why was Mama just telling me what she thought was wrong?  I just look at her.  I don’t ask any more questions.  I can’t put my questions into words.  And I don’t want any more of her answers.  I just want to hug Mama and close my eyes and pretend none of this ever happened.  I don’t want to know the things I know.  I hate the image of masks, attacking me.  I hate elevators.  And I hate the color red.  But I can’t say any of this to Mama.
And the Little Phoebe has no words at all.  Just darkness and a warm little home.  She doesn’t know what’s happening.  What will happen.  She might not even know that there are more people in the world besides her. 
Mama gives me a kiss on the forehead.
I try to imagine Mama giving the Little Phoebe a kiss too.  It’s hard.  Because Mama doesn’t seem like she wants Little Phoebe.  I wonder if she’s a boy or a girl.  I wonder if she’d look like me.  Maybe be good at soccer, like Phoebe was.  Or good at drawing, like I am.  Does she have light hair like me, or dark hair like Phoebe’s?

Mama and I walk back to the waiting room, and as we walk Mama says, “I’ll take you to the play room now.”
“I don’t want to go to the play room,” I protest, “Please can I stay with you?”
“You can’t, I’m going to my appointment.  Daddy’s coming to pick you up soon any way, it wont be long-”
“Can I just wait with you until you have to go?”  Mama stops walking and squishes her mouth to one side. 
“It’s just right there, isn’t it?” I point to the end of the hall with the sunshine sign, and plastic orange gate.
Mama agrees.
My heart beats again.

We sit in the blue cushioned chairs.  The TV in front of us plays some colorful cartoon that includes flowers and happy children.
My mind screams at me.  My chest aches.  I can’t sit here I silence.  I have to say something to Mama.  Something, anything in any effort for voices Little Phoebe. 
I can see her looking at me.  “Can you save me, Tom?”

I see her again.  All of the sudden she’s older, like me, she looks like my Phoebe.  She squeezes me with arms so little soft.  She says, “Thank you for letting me be alive!”
I hug her back.
Tight.
And I don’t let go.

“Lilly Haliber?”
I look up at my Mom’s name.  To our left standing at the door is a skinny woman with curly green hair and baggy flower shirt, looking at her clip board and scanning the waiting room.  I hope Mama didn’t hear her.
“Hello,” Mama grabs her purse from under the chair. Smiling broader and almost as fake as the cartoon on the movie screen.  She stands.  Along with Little Phoebe.  I stand too. 
“Tom, go head to the play room now.”
She turns to the nurse with formal laughter.
My chest pounds so hard I can hear it.  Can anyone else hear it?
“Mama!”
She turns.
“It’s okay Tom, Daddy’s gonna be here soon to pick you up.”
I take her hand as she tries to walk away from me, “Mama don’t go, please don’t go, I want Phoebe, Mama.”
Mama looks back at the nurse, then to me, giving my hair a rub, “Be good.  Keep smiling.”
She turns, pulling her hand away from mine.  Mama and the nurse exchange smiles and happy words. 

And I see Phoebe.  Running out, hair ruffled behind her by the wind, casing my toy air plane, running and leaping up trying to catch it.  She ducked under the orange tape, the place we’ve never been, and kept running after it.
Because I told her to.
Because there’s no such thing as death.  No such thing as killing.

And there’s Little Phoebe, who I’ve never seen, never met, inside my Mama.  And Mama fallows the nurse.  Because Little Phoebe is nobody.  Just a lump of nothing.
What’s she doing right now?  Is she sleeping?  What’s she dreaming about?  Can she dream?
I don’t know.  But it’s going to end. 

And the people hide the blood.  Hiding death underneath smiles and happy words.  It's bright.  But I've noticed; you can't have so much bright without a shadow.
So what's happening in the dark?
Keep smiling.
Keep smiling.
Mama and the nurse disappear.  The door clicks shut.
And Phoebe keeps running.  And the truck doesn't stop for her.
My Phoebe.