Whispered Connections: Firehouse Ghost II

Despair gripped Vic in a vise and whisked him to Jaku’s side. The murderer smirked as he polished the barrel of his .357. “Boom!” He mimicked the loud sound of the gun discharging. “I’m gonna waste that bitch.” He chuckled, imagining the terror on Liz’s face as he jammed the gun against her head and…

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Firehouse Ghost: Unveiling the Other Side

Vic Lazzarini’s ghost scowled at the short, fat-bellied fireman cringing in his jail cell. “Jaku, you sawed-off, lily-livered sneak!” Vic shouted. “Murderer!” He threw what would have been a bone-crunching punch if it hadn’t gone right through the punk’s head. Jaku’s hairy nostrils twitched, his pin-prick eyes darting around the jail cell stinking of urine…

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A Braided Essay: These Dreams of Love III

I Become – Part 3 Twelve years before I fell in love with Barry and a year to the day after Vic’s death on Valentine’s Day, 1985, I felt wrung out with grieving and despairing of ever finding the kind of love I’d found with Vic again. That morning, I awoke in the wee hours,…

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Letter to the Ghosts of Jaku’s Murderer’s Thumbs

What squashed you, Thumbs? Your bully of a boss, Jaku, certainly couldn’t have compressed you playing volleyball, because the only body part Jaku exercised was his mouth—his liar’s lips flapping fast as a hummingbird’s wings. Oh, wait a minute. I’d forgotten about his sticky fingers, which also grabbed wallets, keys and jewelry his coworkers forgot…

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Love in the Lost and Found

In January, 2016, my 94-year-old mom, Ruby, fell in her bathroom in Tucson, Arizona. A blood clot traveled from her hip, still bruised and sore from two falls the previous week, to her brain, causing a massive stroke.  Minutes after the ambulance crew wheeled Mom into the hospital, my brother, John, who’d moved to Tucson…

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