Excerpt from new short story: Running Out The Clock

     The unquiet students found themselves at odds with the story being told about them, that they were destined for the scrap heap and needed something more, that they were somehow lacking.  For them, it wasn't as simple as admitting to having a flaw, but rather that they were defined by the very things that were unfairly denied them, and that, in some cases, they never wanted.  That they had to accept a legacy of immeasurable loss as a birthright.  That it was a loss they would never be able to fully comprehend, let alone mourn.  That they would have to reckon with the echoes of history through the emptiness in their collective conscience.  That life in the full bloom of adolescence must also be in thrall to the ever-unfolding tragedies of the past.  How could they be the heroes and heroines they dreamed themselves to be, as children, when it was they who needed to be saved?
     Rather than reply to the well-intentioned man at the front of the room, Langston deferred to a friend, whose shambling words passed the time until another took up the relay, and another, and then the bell exploded time and space in to the hallway, the door, the weekend outside. "Freedom," Langston uttered, "at last."

New Short Story: "An Errand"

It was late on a Saturday afternoon, and the cool winds brought the smell of impending rain to the city streets.  Namely, they brought it to Jessica Cooper, who was hoping for an entirely different gift from the heavens.  It was the beginning of the month, but big brother Carlos had already laid claim to the meager salary she brought in, to pay off the high-interest loan he co-signed for, to help a friend, now estranged.  Money would continue to be tight the entire month, that much she knew, and the bus was still cheap enough to get around; it was a different kind of normal, just fragile, no more or less satisfying, of no more consequence unless, suddenly, it somehow was.

As if on cue, the bus pulled around the corner as the first drops fell, promptly breaking down at the moment the incipient bands of the downpour assaulted the pavement. Jessica, surrounded by vacant lots, had no choice but to tie up her plastic bags of groceries and trudge to another stop, three blocks away.  Traffic for the big charity gala downtown drove past her, saving a finite amount of goodwill for a different cause, one drier and more tastefully appointed.  It’s not their fault, Jessica thought, as if anyone could really take responsibility for the persistence of suffering.  Besides, it would just be a band-aid until the next time – who has money for a car nowadays? – and a painful reminder that independence is yet a long ways away.  Her godmother Ellie always told her that struggle was the root from which independence sprang.  Three blocks or three thousand miles, no matter, it was just distance.

A block into the walk, a door swung open from a standalone house and a child burst out with abandon, leaping down the front stairs in a single bound.  The child, a little boy, nearly lost his balance on the slippery concrete, but recovered in the kind of ungainly stride that only the innocent can affect.  His eyes never looked up, and he wrapped his arms around Jessica as he crashed into her at top speed.  Three more pairs of eyes searched out from the darkness of th house, watching a strange, wet pantomime from out of earshot.  The approaching lightning and the far-off rotation of clouds injected some urgency into the conversation, enough to convince the small child to put his hand in Jessica’s and walk up to the house.

Maybe the boards in these windows will keep out the storm, she thought, as the rain refused to abate.  All circumstances seemed equally dangerous in the moment, so why not walk inside a strange house with a young child.  Jessica nearly crossed the threshold when everything flickered, but there was no accompanying thunder – just an illusion of a strike, or of shelter, of this episode of living.

Inside the house, there were blankets, a table, children, and now, Jessica Cooper herself.  To enumerate what was missing would be like counting the molecules in the sea, but the salient things – the parents, the heat, the food – were most certainly absent.  Strangely, the kids looked all right, good even though the were drenched, and that’s when she noticed the eldest among them in the corner, tending to an old man in mismatched sports apparel, curled up in the only dry spot in the entire structure.  Wordlessly, the other children walked Jessica across the house to him, past the remnants of load-bearing walls, until together they stood breaking the howling winds.

The tranquil space they now inhabited was lit by what approximated twilight, and Jessica could see the glassy reflection off of the old man’s unblinking eyes.  They all held each other as the eldest child looked to Jessica and motioned toward a can of soda in her shopping bag.  She had nearly forgotten she had it when she saw the man’s desperate state, and shaking off the funk, nodded in assent.  The eldest popped the tab and poured some of it into the man’s mouth, only slightly agape, hoping.  The smallest among them trembled, perhaps from the cold.

The old man’s lips closed slowly, then re-opened, and he shook as he struggled to swallow the erstwhile elixir.  He pulled them all close and whispered something indecipherable.  He pointed at his heart as a great peal of thunder tore through the silence; his eyes watered as the plywood boards fell out into the tall grass; the world poured itself in, and he was gone.

The two middle children, twins, pulled out silver game tokens and placed them over the old man’s eyes as they closed them.  Then all four of them turned to Jessica, and it occurred to her that if the world were run by children, every car would stop for everyone in need, wouldn’t it?  Why couldn’t adults ever measure up to that?

Then, suddenly as it had descended on the city, the storm broke off for destinations east, and a dark mist hung over the city blocks.  The children looked back at Jessica from the door and took off at full sprint into the evening.  Jessica made a sign of the cross – Ellie showed her once – picked up her bags, and walked to the other bus stop.  Fifteen minutes later, she was home.

The little ones were gone when Jessica arrived, but Carlos and Rayshawn were watching an Adam Sandler movie on the television Rayshawn had salvaged from the old terminal at the airport.  Rayshawn received a text from work and left abruptly, so Carlos helped Jessica unpack the bags, laden with soaked cardboard and rainwater.  Jessica looked over at him and before she could say, “I’m sorry,” Carlos pulled her close.  “We may be hungry, but we can make this work,” he said.  They embraced, and finally, after so very long, there was enough.