My book

[sumbirdy]

I'm putting a book togther for my creative writing class. It is a collection of short stories, poems, and essays. I'm going to post everything here (randomly) one at a time so I can get your views of the things I have written. Hope you enjoy them and if you see anything I might need to change please tell me.

REPETITION

It had been a long day. Isabelle Everland had just gotten off of her forty-eight hour shift at the hospital where she worked. She drove over to her sister Lilly’s house to get her golden retriever, Luke. She wanted a mastiff or a Great Dane, but she couldn’t help falling in love with Luke the first time she saw him in that cage at the run down shelter. He was already older then, two or three years, big and handsome.
Now she was driving down the highway into traffic and the sun that was nearly blinding her. She pushed back her short, red hair from her face and turned on the heater. She turned to Luke and petted his big blonde head.
“Okay, Luke, here we go. Right into traffic. It should be about an hour before we get home, if this keeps up.”
Luke whined and laid his head on his paws.
“I agree,” Isabelle sighed. “I hate evenings like this. Where are all these people going, anyway?”
Up ahead she heard screeching tires and screams.
“What the…?” Then she saw it. The car was coming directly toward her. It was in the wrong lane. She swerved to the right and the car smashed into the one that was directly behind her. She could see into the jagged, broken windows and knew instantly that both were dead…or were going to die soon. All she could do was sit there shaking, saying “Oh God. What have I done?” over and over in her head. Luke put his head on her lap and whined.

It had been a long day. Isabelle Everland had just gotten off of her forty-eight hour shift at the hospital where she worked. She drove over to her sister Lilly’s house to get her golden retriever, Luke.
Now she was driving down the highway into traffic and the sun that was nearly blinding her. She pushed back her short, red hair from her face and turned on the heater. She turned to Luke and petted his big blonde head.
“Okay, Luke, here we go. Right into traffic. It should be about an hour before we get home f this keeps up.”
Luke whined and laid his head on his paws.
“I agree,” Isabelle sighed. “I hate evenings like this. Where are all these people going, anyway?”
Up ahead she heard screeching tires and screams.
“What the…?” Then she saw it. The car was coming directly toward her. It was in the wrong lane. She looked in her rearview mirror and saw the man in the car behind her, looking confused. “If I move, “ she thought. “then he’ll be hit.” She decided to risk her life to save his. This all took mere seconds and she opened the passenger door and shoved Luke out a moment before the car crashed into hers. Before all went black she heard the paramedics talking.
“The driver that was in the wrong lane is alive. Don’t know if he’ll make it.”
:”The woman’s fading fast.”
“The guy in the car behind her is dead. Neck’s broken.”
“Neck’s broken?” she thought. “He died? I didn’t save him? Oh, God. What have I done…?

“How’s she doing?”
“She still hasn’t realized that she can save him. She doesn’t save the man, but she always manages to save that dog.”
“Of course.”
“We are going to have to keep her hooked up to this machine. She’s going to have to realize that she can save him.” We’ll try it again. This is the only way we can help her. Third time’s the charm.”
“But this isn’t the third…”
“It’s the third time today. I have a good feeling about this one.”
“What if she does save the guy? What then? Will it change the past really? Will he be alive now?”
“No. He won’t be alive now, but she won’t know that. It’s already been two weeks since the accident and it will be out of the papers. She won’t remember the past two weeks and that’ll be harder to explain, but that part will be up to her family. They already said they would never tell her the truth.”
“Okay, here we go again.”

It had been a long day. Isabelle Everland had just gotten off of her forty-eight hour shift at the hospital where she worked. She drove over to her sister Lilly’s house to get her golden retriever, Luke.
Now she was driving down the highway into traffic and the sun that was nearly blinding her. She pushed back her short, red hair from her face and turned on the heater. She turned to Luke and petted his big blonde head.
“Okay Luke, here we go. Right into traffic. It should be about an hour before we get home if this keeps up.”
Luke whined and laid his head on his paws.
“I agree,” Isabelle sighed. “I hate evenings like this. Where are all these people going, anyway?”
Up ahead she heard screeching tires and screams.
“What the…?” Then she saw it. The car was coming directly toward her. It was in the wrong lane. She looked at the car behind her and saw a man inside. There were no other cars behind him. She had to save him! She pushed Luke out of the car, jumped out herself and ran to the car behind her. She tugged on the door, grabbed the man by the shirt and pulled him out.
“Wha…?” He stumbled out looking bewildered.
Just as they both fell to the pavement the oncoming car slammed into their cars. Paramedics were swarming everywhere and the sirens filled her ears. A paramedic rushed over to them.
She helped Isabelle and the man up. “Are you two okay?” She asked.
“I’m fine.” Isabelle smiled. “I just have a few scratches and I’m a little shaken.”
“And you?” The paramedic turned to the man.
“I’m fine. But my car’s not…”

Isabelle woke up to bright sunlight glaring through the window. Luke whined and looked up at her from the end of the bed. She felt weird. The phone rang and she got up to answer it. She felt wobbly, like she hadn’t been on her feet for weeks.
She picked up the phone. “Hello?”
“Hey honey, how are you?”
“I’m fine. Mom? What happened? I can’t remember the last two weeks.”
Silence.
“Mom?”
“Oh, well honey, you know. You weren’t feeling so well after the accident and you and that man almost got hit and all. You were depressed and the doctor put you on sleeping pills. You were zoned out whenever you were awake so I don’t doubt that you don’t remember.”
“Oh. Well I guess…” She heard a whine and turned to see Luke standing by the door. “I have to go. Luke wants to go for a walk.”
“That poor dog. He really missed you.”
“What?”
“Oh, well, you know. Bye, darling.” Click.
Isabelle hung up the phone and shook her head. “Weird.” She looked at Luke and smiled. “Come on boy, I feel like I haven’t bee out in the sun in a long time.” Together, they walked out the door.

Two years later, Isabelle was trying to clean out her closet when she found a stack of old newspapers. On top of the stack was a newspaper with the headlines “TWO MEN KILLED IN CAR ACCIDENT.”
“I don’t remember this.” She looked at the date. “Two years ago.” She scanned the paper and then, not believing her eyes, scanned it again. “Oh, God.” She got up, went to the phone, and dialed her mothers’ number.
It rang four times before her mother answered. “Hello?”
“Mom? It’s Isabelle. I found this paper from two years ago. January tenth. It says…”
“Oh, dear. I know what it says. Where did you get that paper?”
“It was in my closet.”
“How did it get there? It shouldn’t have been there. I bet it was your father. He was over there taking care of your house while you were gone. He must of left it there.”
“What? None of this is making sense.”
“Meet me at Sasha’s café for lunch and I’ll tell you about it there.”

Isabelle pulled up in front of the café and took a deep breath. She was about to find out if her family has been lying to her for two years.
“Maybe this is just a joke.” She said to herself “or maybe it’s just a horrible dream.”
She went inside and instantly saw her mother sitting at a table in the corner. She
stood and stared at her for a moment. Her own mother has been lying to her for two years. She walked over there and sad down across from her. The waiter came by and they ordered their drinks. They waited for him to give them their drinks before they said anything to each other.
“So?” Isabelle looked at her mother. “Would you like to tell me what’s going on?”
Her mother sighed. “If I must.” She took a long drink of her soda. “Where do I start?”
“The beginning would be nice.”
“Okay. Two years ago, on January 9th, you were driving down the highway after you had gotten off work. You had just picked up Luke from Lilly’s and you were on the way home. I don’t really know all the details because I wasn’t there but from what people told me, and what I read in the paper, a drunk man was driving down the wrong side of the lane. He was coming directly toward you and apparently you swerved to the side of the road so that he wouldn’t hit you. There was a man in a car directly behind you and he didn’t have time to move before the car hit him. That man died instantly, the drunk lived for another thirty minutes. You thought it was your fault and you couldn’t forgive yourself.”
“Don’t stop. Just tell me the rest.”
“Well, nobody could get through to you after that, you just zoned out on everyone. We took you to a specialist who recommended somebody else. Dr. Williams. Dr. Williams is a genius, he invented a machine that can take you back in time, virtually. The machine gets into your brain and remakes the memory. But every time you could do something different. When you first get hooked up to the machine it replays the memory exactly how it was and you do exactly the same things. It keeps repeating it and you keep doing things differently. I don’t know exactly how it works. Dr. Williams wanted you to save the man, once you did that then that would be your new memory of the event and take place of the old one. You were on that machine for two weeks. Each time you did something different but you never managed to save him…until that last time. That was the memory we wanted for you so he took you off of it, that was two years ago. You always thought that you saved him and I wasn’t going to tell you anything different. I didn’t want you to go back to the way you were. I was only doing what was best for you, do you understand?”
“Yeah, I think I do.”
Her mother smiled. “Good. I know I should’ve told you before, but I just couldn’t.”
“What was the mans name, in the car behind me? I want to visit his grave.”
“Oh, honey.”
“Please,” she looked up at her mother. “Please.”


The wind was blowing her hair as she walked into the graveyard. She walked between the rows until she found his grave. Mick Peterson, 1980-2006, may he fly with the angels. He was so young. Tears stung her eyes. “It wasn’t my fault.” She told herself. “It was just an accident. Things like this happen and it’s nobody’s fault. Well maybe it was that drunk drivers fault. Not mine.” Tears were running down her face and she couldn’t make them stop. She knew that she would never come here again, she just couldn’t. This was the last chance to say what was on her mind.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I’m so sorry.” She stared at the barren trees and let the wind carry the words away.

[sumbirdy]

BALLAD OF A DARK AND RAINY NIGHT

It was a dark and rainy night
The night that her daddy died.
He crashed into a tree
And all night her mommy cried.

It was a dark and rainy night
The night that her friends drove drunk and died.
They ran off a cliff
And her mother held her as she cried.

It was a dark and rainy night
The night that her fiancé died.
He was driving to their wedding
And beside his grave she cried.

It was a dark and rainy night
The night that her mother died.
She was holding her hand as she took her last breath
And her vision blurred as she cried.

It was a bright and beautiful day
The day that she died.
She was laying in the nursing home
With no one by her side.

[sumbirdy]

SPEAKING OF THE DEVIL

She tried to tell herself that she was dreaming but she knew that she wasn’t. She walked through the hall with glass on both sides. She wanted to reach out and touch it, to feel if it was cold, but she was too afraid. She continued walking knowing exactly where she was going as if she’d been here before. He was waiting for her. She didn’t know who he was but she knew he was waiting.
She got to the end of the hall and walked into a room with a single chair, like the one’s in dentist’s offices, and a huge screen in front of it.
“Miss Levins, I’m so glad you made it.” She turned towards the voice and saw a tall man, or was he a man? He seemed to be transparent and shimmering. As she looked closer she saw that his skin was actually moving and that it was a metallic color.
“Please, sit down.” She sat, although uneasily, in the chair. “Now, look at this screen please. This shows your condition on Earth.”
“My condition?” it was the first thing she had said to him.
“Um, yes. You are, I am pleased to say, in a coma. You are, as you would say on Earth, at Death’s door.” He said smiling broadly, as if this was a major accomplishment.
“How…?” She couldn’t get the rest of the question out.
“Questions now. Answers maybe...hopefully never.” He had stopped making sense now. “Knack and all is all it is. Screen please, Miss Levins.”
She looked at the screen and saw herself lying in a hospital bed. Her family surrounding her, her parents crying, her sister holding her hand.
“Now,” he said, switching it off almost directly after it came on. “I have some questions that determine if you wake up r not. I hope you give the wrong answers.”
“Wha…?”
“Question one! Who are you going to marry?”
“I don’t…”
“Wrong answer. Two. What will your first child’s name be?”
Her eyes widened.
“I’m sorry, you took too long. Three. Who was the president in year 3542?”
“3542?! It’s only 20…”
“Nope, I’m sorry. Wrong again.” He said gleefully. “You only have one left. If you get this one right I’ll let you go. It’s worth all the others. Question four. Who is the Devil?”
“You are.” She said.
“I wasn’t expecting you to get that one. You’re smarter than I thought. I guess you’ll go to Earth now. But I’ll see you again…soon.” With that he was gone.


She woke up to bright lights and fuzzy figures standing over her.
“Doctor! She’s awake!”
A tall man came in. she looked at him and he seemed so familiar. There was something about him.
The hallway. The room. The chair. The shimmering man. It rushed at her all at once and she knew. She knew.
“Miss Levins, I’m so glad you made it.”

[sumbirdy]

MY PET

Uno. That word has come to mean more to me in the last two years than a simple Spanish word. That word is the name that I gave to my very special dog, Uno.

When our dog was pregnant I thought, “There’s no way we are keeping a puppy.” When they were born I thought, “We’ll find them good homes.” And when they opened their eyes and we found that one of the pups had only one eye, I thought “Somebody will love him” Little did I know that we would be keeping this one-eyed pup.

I started calling him Uno when he was three-weeks old. He was always sick as a puppy. His immune system was weak and he was always getting infections. He would often get so sick that he wouldn’t be able to move. Nobody thought he would make it. He proved us wrong. My Uno is a fighter.

Today he is perfectly healthy. He enjoys all things dog including eating worms, swimming in the pond, getting his summer haircut, and listening to my ideas of stories that I want to write. He’s a very unique dog. Uno means one and I think that is a very fitting name for my one-and-only one-eyed dog.

[DrKym]

Took me a while to read through it all but very well done.

[sumbirdy]

Thank you. And there's more to come

[sumbirdy]

THE MOUSE

Skitter, skitter, running mouse
Somehow he got inside the house
Eeekk! Mom cried.
Get him away, get him outside!
The swish, swish of the broom
Quickly swept him out of the room.

[sumbirdy]

I am like the window
You can look out
But it’s not always easy
To look in

[sumbirdy]

FISH

Little fish in the
Blue, clear sparkling water
It’s so far to swim

[sumbirdy]

PUPPY

Hey, little puppy
Why are you running so fast?
Are they calling you?

[sumbirdy]

DARKNESS

Soft shadows, whisper
Owl hooting, calling for night
The moon is my guide.

[sumbirdy]

WATER

Coolness rushes past
Trickling past my fingers, wet.
Water fills the sink.

[sumbirdy]

DOE

Sweet little brown doe
Grazing in the soft green grass
Why do you look so sad?

[sumbirdy]

MEMORY

Fluffy, soft white clouds
Drift slowly, lazily by
I remember them