Tag Archives: lillie mcferrin

Aftertaste


The cold didn’t bother me; the shivers wracking my body were well worth the price of the much needed darkness, the favor of a shrouded moon. I sat with my arms wrapped tightly around my scrunched up legs, my feet frozen and bare, kneading the moist earth beneath them. Tears weren’t an option for they would do nothing to ease the pain and they certainly wouldn’t change the ridiculous choices I had made, nor the ones she had forced me into. Without anyone attempting to reach me, she had died, been buried and properly mourned; her life celebrated for its passionate creativity and for the fierce hold she had had on those who loved her. Every shred of hope I had harbored that there would be at least a single moment to love her again (not that I had ever stopped, mind you) was gone, and the only way I knew to get through such a tragedy was to embrace the blessed darkness and endure the bitter cold just as I had endured the bitterness she had died tasting.

Aftertaste is my response to Lille McFerrin’s weekly Five Sentence Fiction challenge. This week’s word: moon

Lillie McFerrin Writes

If I told you

You will blush if I tell you what he did to me.

If I told you about the way he kissed me, his passion devouring my lips like fine chocolate, you would be okay, your face impassive, colorless.

Even if I told you about us falling into bed, hungry as wild animals deprived too long from succulent, wild kill, you would merely smile at the imagery.

But if I told you about the way he looked at me, with his eyes wide open and tender, with his heart fully on his sleeve, talking to me, loving me completely, you would blush because what came next obliterated everything rational.

It’s hard for me to tell you what he said, to actually say it without blushing myself, but you must know, I have to share this: “You feel like breathing,” he said.

This week’s word: blush

Lillie McFerrin

Ben

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It was 1788, and Ben had just realized how long it had been since he had fully relaxed; breathed deeply and just blended in for a change. Ever the popular, intelligent, erudite inventor, statesman, (ladies man) and much more, he had grown weary of seeming like someone he was not; the public persona, while it had its definite perks, no longer satisfied him.

But it was quite difficult to shed all that had defined him for so long; in fact it seemed impossible. What he longed for was a bit of escapism, and so he decided, right then and there, that he would disappear, become a man of obscurity–a man whose adventures and full abandon would be nobody’s business but his own. Little did he know that reckless abandon was never meant to define him, as he would rest in perpetual infamy, a man of seemingly perfect composure, preserved nicely on the first United States postage stamp, and on nearly (there were botched experiments) every one hundred dollar bill in existence.

This week’s word from Lillie McFerrin’s site is “composure.”

Lillie McFerrin Writes

Booty

It shows the three of them, all lugging massive, still-gurgling, dirty, dead bodies behind them, trudging up the hill; straight up, in fact–a legendary photo that finds many folks shaking their heads in disbelief; shunning the impossible fable.

But history, as well as cold-hard-facts; crime data to be exact, tell us that between July, 3062 and March, 3075, Ruth, Delilah, and Annabelle Sparrow, seemingly innocent and sweet grandmothers, traveled the United States on a crime-binge of unbelievable proportions, ridding town after town of unmentionable tattoo-less men of prominence and greed. No one, neither police, nor widowed wives, not ex-girlfriends or grieving mothers tried to stop them, despite the heinous and open nature of their deeds.

If legend holds true, and I believe that it does, hoards of people in city after city after state after state, cheered them on, cooked them meals, and showered them with jewels for eliminating the riff-raff; the men responsible for perpetuating the lies of freedom that had not only cost everyone their dignity, but had also kept the United States from inclusion in the nearly world-wide peace treaty negotiated between now-powerful nations who had long ago embraced transparent and honest-dealings; foregoing super powers for humanism.

It would be two hundred years before a gigantic time-capsule found at the bottom of Lake Geneva, which used to be filled with luscious green water, would reveal more pictures of three toothy grinning grandma-rebels, plus the incredible booty these unlikely pirates had collected in those few years just prior to the occupation of the former United States.

Lillie McFerrin Writes

Just Weeds

If it hadn’t been for the wide open space; the five-thousand acre oasis requiring a two-hundred-twenty-five mile drive down a long, dusty, rocky, rutted road to get there, and a couple of laid-back neighbors who could not care less what I do with my land, I would have been busted a long time ago. But I have no time to ponder these blessings, this unexpected serendipity that has fertilized my dreams and nearly brought to fruition not only a near-lifetime of labor, but also the answer to the world’s most desperate prayer.

Today I will boast, yes boast, that all of my long-held beliefs have been true; that big-business, money-monging, greedy assholes are responsible for the unthinkable disease that permeates a planet that used to have–yes, I know this will sound unbelievable–green grass, fresh-grown vegetables, fruit trees taller than I, humans who stood over six feet tall, blue skies, a crashing, ebbing, flowing ocean (yes, I know this word is archaic), a cheese-ball moon (humor you can’t possibly understand), and children who could play in areas called “parks,” with structures built, not for work, but for play…pure, unadulterated, non-diseased, unbelievable freeplay.

Laugh if you will, but be among the shocked; those who will bow down, still open-mouthed, and beg for manna that could easily garner me god-like, heady praise, unlimited profit, and unthinkable power (Don’t be disgusted-I want none of it!), all for the simplest of cures; cures that could, if not for the political stand-still of two parties who choose being “right” over “doing” right, forfeiting peace in the process, eradicate cancer and a host of other diseases.

Today, an army of those who have trusted me, worked by my side, cast aside nay-saying family members and feigned death for this project, will march proud and strong; demonstrating and carrying the cure for cancer in their pocket, a cure that was right under our ignorant noses and only needed dirt, uncontaminated water (don’t ask!), sunlight (of which we barely had enough), and time until the perfect harvest.

Lillie McFerrin

This week’s word prompt was Harvest