My feet left a trail of wet footprints across the bedroom floor, as I hurried through the room to turn up the television, stopping only to snatch up my silk bathrobe from the bed as I passed. I had been showering in my on suite bathroom, listening to the nights soaps through the open door, when they had been interrupted suddenly by an urgent local broadcast that I now hastened to listen to. As I approached the screen, its image switched from that of a young reporter, to a map of the state, and an area outlined in red at its centre I quickly recognized was indicating a town less than twenty… Read more

“Geez Mom,” complained David Michaels as he dropped the two suitcases down in the hotel room. Rachel Michaels peered over his shoulder entering the room to see the problem. She noticed it immediately. Instead of two double customarily found in an interstate motel room, there was just one queen size bed. A frown creased her 38-year old lips. “Don’t worry honey, I’ll call the front desk,” she walked past her college bound son and straight to the phone. She plopped her 120-pound frame on the bed and picked up the old style rotary phone. Dialing ’0′, Rachel connected with the operator. “M… Read more

I worked at a fast-food hamburger joint, working late most nights, coming home at about eleven, and sometimes as late as midnight or one. One night in particular, I stopped and grabbed a cup of coffee at an all-night convenience market, intending to stay up and do some reading. I had the next day off, and I was pretty much a night person, anyway. I found the door locked when I got home, and had to go around to the back. I found my mother awake, sitting in front of the television set. I could see her through the patio’s sliding glass door. She was wearing a tiny nightie, a see-through affair… Read more