Home

She'd been coming to this beach town for years. Everything was as familiar as home. Everything was as monotonous as home: the wind-and-sand-worn pastel houses scrubbed to bare wood around the edges, the nautical theming of every cottage garden, the sour smell of sea on the air. Every summer for two weeks, Imelda would take her deck chair, carry it past the tall sea grass, and plant its feet in the sand. She'd bring a book and a lunch and a hat, and bronze herself while she read, after she read, before afternoon coffee. Then she'd go back to her own little house, open all the windows for the breeze, and shower off the salt and sun screen under sheets of hot water. A nap and a cuddle with her cat would complete the day before a light dinner, a stroll--always the same route, one way or the other--and bed.

When she told him about it in the bored tone that replaced her original enthusiasm, Anthony said he thought it sounded idyllic. "Come and see it," she told him. "It's an idyllic seaside cliche."

She repositioned the Adirondack chairs on the little deck out back. She vacuumed sand and grass off the rag rug in the little living room. She sank a new multicolored pinwheel into the soil near the steps up to her front door. She noticed--for the first time in years--the picture frame made of seashells filled with a photograph of her niece from a visit years ago. The girl had graduated college last year.

It all had to look perfect. It looked bright and fresh, especially after a brief afternoon rain. And Anthony's smile when he saw it made it better, made it different, made it new.


-----------
Parlay
verb tr.: 1. To use an initial asset into something more valuable.

This account is still active, despite appearances to the contrary. It WILL be completely revived this year.

Notes
Personal stuff and indulgence of the resulting blues has kept me from posting my words. It's time to get back into the swing. It's been too long. I have 15 minutes before it's tomorrow and must get cracking.

Word: Linctus
Meltitia stirred the linctus in the pot above the fire, its sweet, thick, berry fumes filling the room. The scent wafted toward Barty, who lounged beneath a blanket on the chaise across the chamber from the fireplace where Meltitia worked. Barty could only see her back silhouetted by the fire's glow. He coughed violently.

"Hold your horses, I'm coming," said Meltitia. She spooned the mixture into a shallow bowl and trudged across the room. Barty watched her come, gripped the knife beneath the blanket, fingered the wire-wrapped hilt. The anticipation was almost sexual, wondering what it would feel like to slide the knife between the apothecary's ribs.

She'd been poisoning him for weeks. The time had come to return the favor. Barty coughed again. Maltitia picked up her pace.
-----------------------------

linctus
n. A syrupy liquid medicine, especially for treating coughs.

...will come this evening. Late night last night, not a lot of sleep. Can't write, I have teh sleepies.

The century's longest winter kept us indoors day by day. Margot stalked the house wrapped in her thick, lilac cardigan, her arms folded tightly across her chest, her slowly silvering hair pulled back into a severe and sloppy ponytail. Her path was identical, predictable each day: bedroom to bathroom, bathroom to kitchen, kitchen to living room to den to bedroom, round and round. She spoke to no one, usually until dinner. Heaven help the one of us who got in her way, interrupted her endless pilgrimage to who knows where. Before she'd begin her daily circuit, Bart and I would make sure we'd stake out our own perches, his by the fireplace with whatever he was reading, me in the wing-backed chair by the window and the radiator. With the snow so deep outside, the only thing visible, the only break in the monotonous view were the periodic stiricides that pierced the snowpack just outside the window -- like the one that had taken Casper from us. He'd been trying to clear the vents one warmer-than-usual day. I hated to think of him out in the snow, layered in like a Pompeiian caught in pyroclastic flows. But there would be no retrieving him until the thaw.

Maybe we should have let Margot go get him when it first happened. But then she'd be gone, too.


------------------------
stiricide (1656 -1656)
1. n. falling of icicles from a house

I shouldn't do this to myself, but I'm going to anyway. Remember, how jaylake used to keep his storywords journal, taking a word each day and writing a quick little piece around it? Back in March I started to do this with a separate LJ devoted to the purpose. Then I stopped, started and stopped again. A couple of days ago I started again. I'm going public with it now to keep myself honest, to make myself keep going. If I set up a public expectation for myself, maybe I'll keep doing it, and push myself into writing again. So that's what I'm going to do. Posting this here and over at my public, personal journal. We'll see what happens.

Mother's rimestock sat there on the shelf. I'd left it there after she died, watched it glow every single night since then, calling me to pick it up, pore through its pages, use the magic accumulating as it waited. Tristan would arrive soon, my first visitor in literally years. There would be no way to hide that glow. Even wrapping the old book in fabric and stashing it in a drawer wouldn't quench that sickly green light. What to do?

--------------------------------
rimestock (1662 -1834)
1. n. old almanac with runic writings

She leaned back in the hard wood hair. She was done fighting. She had no choice. She was staying put. The ropes around her wrists were already rubbing her skin; the ropes around her knees and ankles, binding her legs so tightly to the chair left her legs nearly numb. She could hear the stone in the next room, screeching under the knife blade. When she closed her eyes, all she could see were sparks and a sharp, cutting edge.

---------------------------------
staycation
1. n. A stay-at-home vacation.

The doctor examined her patient carefully. Fibers threaded through the wound in the man's thigh. She folded back the limp flesh from the wound opening. Strands had already begun to knit themselves to the muscles. It looked like cotton there in the leg, strings of cotton, knitting themselves into replacement skin and muscles. She'd never seen the like before.

-------------------------
fabrefaction
(in common use between 1652-1678 CE)
1. act of fashioning or making a work of art

The plan for this journal, which takes its cue from jaylake's storywords community, is for me to pick a word each day and write a short piece of fiction about it. I need to keep my hand in, keep writing, and it doesn't take much to write short little bursts of fiction; I just have to stay disciplined about it. I may end up doing more than one piece per day if the one I write seems to me to be good enough to try to send to someone else in the hopes they'll pay me for it. But one way or another, my intent is to write something each day. We'll see how it goes. Wish me luck!