The Confabulator Cafe

Author: emosher

  • The Woman who Slipped Below

    “Help!” they cried, running toward my tower chair, stumbling over little sand dunes on their way. An older man and woman, and a middle aged man.

    “She’s drowning!”

    I stand and scan the lake where they are pointing. The surface is glassy. Unperturbed. I grab my red rescue tube and slide down the ladder. I run toward the three.

    “Where?” I shout.

    “Just there!” they say, they all point to the same place in the lake.

    “I don’t see anyone!”

    “She’s flailing, man!” Says the older woman in the tankini. I scan the lake and the beach again. The half-dozen other beach goers are looking at me.

    “Go!” she says. (more…)

  • Hope Chest

    The key hadn’t been on Georgia’s ring yesterday, but she found it there now. She held it up to be sure she recognized it—the antique brass key to her cedar hope chest. Lost for years. But how did it get on her ring?

    She narrowed her eyes, suspecting the orderlies. The staff at Pine Acres Independent Living were helpful, tidy, and efficient. They seemed to organize while Georgia wasn’t looking. Like the Brownies of folklore. Though they were sometimes so quick about it that her crossword books got re-shelved before she’d finished all the puzzles.

    No matter. Having the key back was a gift, even if an orderly had entered without knocking. She stood, mindfully as the occupational therapist had instructed, to reopen the box of whatever wedding gifts remained unused after 57 years.

    She opened the narrow linen closet door and lifted her heirloom quilt from the chest’s lid. She brushed about six years’ worth of dust from it—six years since she and Benjamin had moved in here together. Four years by herself. But they key had been gone long before they’d come to Pine Acres. She fitted it into the lock and turned. The antique mechanism clicked and Georgia lifted the lid. (more…)

  • Dolphin

    “Six hours into my labor I broke into the Shedd Aquarium. There, alone in dolphin exhibit on that little underwater shelf where the trainers stand, I birthed my son. Drenched in cold saltwater, blood, and amniotic fluid and backdropped by Lake Michigan in the Moonlight, I became a mother. The dolphins joined in chorus with my son’s first cries and the power of the universe overwhelmed my soul.”

    So that just popped into my head.  That was my friend Stella’s birth story. She related it while we were sharing birth stories at the hospital new mom’s group four years ago. I had been life flighted for an emergency c-section, but Stella’s story stole the show.

    I love Stella. Stella’s my friend, so I try to forget when she tells me something illegal she’s done. If I’m thinking of her off the radar operations now, I know I’m in trouble.

    You see, I’d just gotten off the phone with Carolyn’s preschool teacher. I’d been getting suspicious about some things and the phone call made it all worse.

    “It’s procedure,” Ms. Gina had said. “The doctor’s office sends the results of that test directly to us. You can always request a copy for your own files.”

    “Thank you,” I’d said. “I’ll get around to it. The health department keeps track of all that for us anyway.”

    Then I laughed and Ms. Gina had chuckled with me. I hung up. And I’d been sitting at the kitchen table with chills running over my skull and bile in the back of my throat until just now, when Stella’s breaking and entering stunt birth story popped into my head. (more…)

  • Cat in Heels

    Cat pegged the young man as a sucker even as he approached the gate to the Magic City. He’s my mark for sure, she thought, regarding his honest face. Then he opened his mouth and removed all doubt.

    “You can’t come in without life insurance,” the guard said to the honest-looking farm boy.

    “What?”

    “Life insurance, pal. You want to seek your fortune? You gotta be insured. Otherwise, you better go back to the provinces.” The guard paused. “Actually,” he said in a softer voice, “You’d be safer if you did go back.”

    The young man looked so darn lost and sweet and innocent that most decent folk would feel compelled to help him.

    Dammit, thought Cat. Now everyone’s going to target him.

    She moved fast. She clipped toward him on her four-inch high heels, hoping the kid fancied girls.  Cat’s looks were her third greatest asset. (more…)

  • Not Actually Very Funny At All

    Terry is a Joke. And a bad one, too. But Terry is bringing home a new roll of Certs from the Kwik Shop because he is going to help Amanda find a new job. His breath must smell better than normal so that she won’t send him away when he opens his mouth.

    On his way back to his apartment building, Terry passes some real people on the street. Compulsory chuckles escape this man and that woman. Real people never find him humorous, but it strikes them as impolite not to laugh at the young man’s existence.

    Oh well, Terry thinks as he dips his head to accept their recognition. (more…)

  • Mantis Memory Beads

    For every life I take, I add a bead to the bracelet. I select his bead while he doses in the sheets beside me. Sweet man. All of them were sweet—the beads on my bracelet. Elsewise our children would grow to be monsters.

    “What are you doing?” he asks from the shadows. (more…)

  • Wedding Breakfast

    The morning after the wedding, Asa stands at the center of a circle of his kin. Overhead, a startled shout sounds from the bridal suite. It is followed by an audible scuffle and the gathered family laughs. Asa’s uncles are pulling Matthias from his wedding bed.

    Gavin and Griswald, both in their forties and strongest of the Stonehaven uncles, drag the naked and hollering new bridegroom down the inn stairs. His butt smacks each step on the way down. Asa winces for his friend. The chuckling circle of Stonehavens parts to allow the trio into the center and closes behind them. As they reach him, the uncles force Matthias to his knees before Asa.

    The young bridegroom breathes hard, his face red with rage. Asa smirks at Matthias’ tan. The swarthy and muscly farm boy is milk white and scrawny from the waist down. Matthias glares up at Asa, but goes quiet as he notices his friend’s clothes. The anger in his face gives way to fear.

    Asa looms above him, wielding a black, iron sickle. Matthias had always teased Asa about his figure—an overlarge head of shaggy, flaxen hair atop a rail thin body. Broom handle, he’d said. Stickbug. Now, Asa looks predatory. A mantis, clad in the blood red robes of The Witch.

    Gavin and Griswald release Matthias’ shoulders and he slumps from his knees to his buttocks on the cold, stone floor. Griswald, the man’s new father-in-law, ruffs Matthias’ hair before retreating to the general circle of Stonehavens. (more…)

  • The Resurrection

    Hezakiel was agitated about something again. Volesteus could tell because she was pacing in front of his desk. She had also bent her halo from a circle into something resembling an infinity symbol.

    Volesteus sighed and closed his minesweeper window. He’d reached the maximum time limit already and still couldn’t decide which of the last two boxes hid final mine. He hated when they all exploded.

    “What’s eating you, Hez?”

    “Have you read the news?” (more…)

  • Swagger and Sway

    I didn’t know I was bagging a sorceress’s groceries. First of all, I didn’t know sorceresses bought groceries. I mean, I guess they had to eat, too. Second, the groceries looked normal. Eggs, celery, cucumbers, mayonnaise, one gossip magazine, and twelve boxes of anise tea. Well mostly normal. But the real reason I didn’t know they were for a sorceress was that the person paying for them was powerfully built bald man in a light grey suit.

    Thing really changed for me when the man’s cellular rang.

    “Madam?” he said into the small flip phone. How old was that thing? But he just said “Yes madam.” Pause “Yes madam.” And then he hung up and looked right at me. I don’t really feel comfortable with being visible, so I hunched.

    “You’re to follow me.” He said. (more…)

  • The Sea and the Sky

    “She’s ready for takeoff,” said Germaine, Tony’s flight instructor. He motioned toward the waiting Cessna.

    “What, already?” Tony’s voice cracked a little. Apparently some of Martha’s fear of flying had rubbed off on him over the years.

    Germaine laughed at him. “I’ll be right next to you you at the controls. It’s okay to be nervous.”

    That cinched it. Tony was not going to be timid in front of Germaine. He liked Germaine; Germaine was a nice person, an honest person and with a great confidence about him, for such a pup. Tony was more than twice his instructor’s age and that fact shamed him into action.

    “Let’s go,” he said, barely stopping himself from adding, “young man.”

    This was such a lot of work to do to simply cheat on his wife. But it was important to Tony’s ego that he take an equally astonishing and magnificent lover as Martha had already found for herself. Fair was fair. (more…)