Darlene’s husband, Warren Mason, sells his lumber company for twenty million dollars. They build a forty-five hundred square foot deck house on thirty wooded acres bounded by three hundred acres of conservation land in rural North Carolina and plan to grow old amidst the trees. Five years after they build the house, while cutting down a diseased tree, Warren collapses and dies. Darlene considers moving closer to town, but cannot bear the thought of leaving the birds, the deer, the unseen creatures that forage through the woodlands and visit her backyard. At eighty-three years old, Darlene resolves to live and die in her beloved home.
Continue reading “An Arrangement by Kenneth N. Margolin”Tag: widowhood
The Circle Route by Paul Kimm
Jennifer finished the last slice of defrosted quiche she’d bought from the freezer shop on Monday. She switched off the gas fire. In the kitchen she rinsed off the plate under the tap, pastry crumbs, and slotted it on the drying rack. She put on her coat, shoes, unlocked the back door, stepped outside, locked it, and walked the five minutes to the bus stop nearest her house.
Continue reading “The Circle Route by Paul Kimm”The Lady’s Photo by Tom Sheehan
The last thing Burt Shantell said to me was, “I’m not going to make it, Tom, but take this photo of my wife, Myrna, and tell her the last words I said were about her, and she’s in Stockard, Montana.”
I tried to quiet him; “Take it easy, Burt, you’ll be okay. The Medics are in the next bunker,” which was a lie, of course, a soft sponge of a lie.
Because I was talking to a dead man, a dead comrade, in Korea in 1951. The next thing was seeing him in a body rack as we moved along the trail on the other side of Lake Hwachon, already having seen a pal from my hometown, and another high school opponent from Lynn, Massachusetts, the town abutting one side of my home town, Saugus.
Continue reading “The Lady’s Photo by Tom Sheehan”