Once Upon A Time...Part 1

...in the forgotten borough of a city that many considered the navel of the world, there lived a boy and a girl and in the way of boys and girls that they knew, they met in a comic book store and shared occasional afternoons discussing the delights of the worlds they found therein, enjoyed flights of art and fancy, and shared theories and opinion on various books they enjoyed.

And though they were not the best of friends (for the boy was a few years older than the girl and their circles ran a bit differently at the time) they were still quite fond of one another. Still, in the natural "way of things," they lost touch for a little while.

This was important and necessary, because the girl still had growing to do (being very young still) and the boy was first discovering his footing through the world as a man.

Because of this, and because it was the trade of his father, the boy (now a young man) became a steel worker, and this he did for several years. The girl still had to finish high school and begin college.

But our now young-man was unhappy working with steel, preferring to swing it instead, and the girl, who was now a young woman, had more interest in saving damsels (and others) in distress rather than becoming one.


Both had been very affected by those books they had read at such tender age (and this, dear reader, should warn you that what you read you may very well become, so be very careful of what you let into your mind).


They each pondered the problem and despite the separation of time and space (for how did one become a hero-knight in a land where heroes were considered a fairy-tale found only in the books they had read, and steel in public frowned upon) they each hit upon the same solution.

And so it came to pass that one fine chilly spring morning, the young woman would walk into an ambulance base for her first day at this particular location and be assigned as a partner to the young man who had been her friend.

Such was the beginning of the order of the Tin Can Knights (and the Brotherhood of Blood, but that is another story).

Toys In the Attic

Spent the majority of today writing, and one of the things my character was focused on was a toy from childhood and that special toy, small and worthless as it is, is invaluable to her. It's a key to so much...

It made me think about that one thing, the one special thing, that I have from a time almost before I have memory.

It's a pair of boats, simple boats, made of wood. One's painted green, the other a mustard yellow.

Both were made by my Dad, one for me, one for my brother. The paint on the bottoms of both is mostly worn off, but not the our names written in indelible ink.

It was only about a year and a half ago that my brother and I looked at them very closely and discovered that if you look carefully under the paint on the smokestacks, you can see, stamped and stenciled in tiny letters, that my father named those boats after our Mom.

What's your special toy? What's that one thing that you have that's the key to that special place, days of endless summer or never-ending dreams?

Con Part XI

Well...it was a long time ago. I'm grateful for family and friends that helped me find my way when I realized it was time, and more than, to leave the dark hole I'd been living in.

It was an effort, a tremendous one, to make myself eat, to still my hands and not seek to make the outside bleed like the inside did until finally, one day, it just didn't happen anymore.

And...I found my way, my path, a path that eventually took me so very far away from those days: I ate, I worked, I played, and on a day I didn't expect it, I fell in love. She was...is...the most amazing person I know, and as my mind swam forward through the years to the present, I understood, understood in ways I'd never had before, why.

"We were so good together," she said, almost a whisper into the breeze as it lightly blew the hair about her shoulders. "We could have had everything." We both watched as she twisted the ring that sat on her finger.

The soft chime in my pocket startled us both, and back to the present, I pulled my cell phone out. "Hey baby," I greeted softly. The tone that rang I'd programmed just for her. "How're you doing?"

"I'm fine, baby--I'm on my way. Where are you?"

I smiled. "That's not necessary, Tee--this thing ends in another hour or so, and I'll be home before you know it."

"Dork." She laughed, that light sound that I loved to hear and lifted my heart with it. "I'm already at the Center--I've met a dozen Jedi knights, several Stormtroopers and three Batmans, and I just passed the place you're supposed to be. Let me guess--you're outside smoking?"

"Not exactly," I chuckled, "just the one -- only half."

"Hey, I see you!" she said excitedly. "I'm right by the door."

"Don't come out, it's cold," I cautioned, "I'll come in to you." I could see her face through the glass not twenty feet away and I waved before I put my phone back in my pocket.

"No," I said finally to Beth, "we couldn't. But I do, now."

I walked away and left her there, not knowing or caring if she watched or followed and as I pulled the heavy glass door open, I felt it rush out and over me when Tee pulled me into her arms, a blanket that spoke of warmth and love. I was loved, I was loved...I was loved. And I loved just as much in return.

I breathed it in, the scent and feel of her, my life in my hands and held close against my body, my heart thudding against her chest as I nuzzled into her neck. "I'm so glad you're here," I murmured, then took her face gently within my hands and kissed her.

"Mmm...me, too," she agreed. "The lab called, just a little while ago," she added softly.

"Yeah?" I asked just as quietly and I felt my body go still. "What did they say?"

"They said," she began, then reached up the slightest bit to kiss my nose, "that we're both going to need to watch the stress levels, because we are." She leaned back to grin at me, the smile lighting her face even more.

"We 'are'?" I repeated dumbly, a smile breaking across my face to match the band of light that spanned my chest.

Tee nodded.

"We are!" I whispered, awed, and pulled her close to me again.

I felt rather than saw Beth walk by.

"Who is that?" Tee asked, staring at her back as she disappeared into the crowd.

"No one," I said, and kissed her fingers before I let them go to wrap my arm around her shoulders. "No one that matters."

Con Part X

It wasn't the cold, and it wasn't the ringing in my head. It wasn't even the heavy sound of wind that rushed through my ears or the strange heaviness that filled me from the diaphragm down.

It was something simple: my hand. I couldn't move my hand and it was the near panic at losing that sort of control over something so very basic that set my heart to racing and my breath catching in my chest as I tried to sit up.

"Baby, take it easy," Beth's voice soothed, her hands pressed against my chest and as I looked over her head, I saw my brother, my brother whom I hadn't seen since just before Beth, I, we...

"Get your hands away from her - you've done enough."

It was an easy enough story to put together - we'd almost been side swiped on the left side by another vehicle and in an attempt to avoid the car in front of us, the rapid deceleration caused the car behind to slam into us which threw our vehicle into the right lane where we then hit another car, then flipped.

Noah had protected me from the drum case that had tumbled our way, but no one could have prevented my arm from breaking between my body and the second side impact.

And no one could have prevented the internal damaged wreaked by the sharp blow against my lower back.

I myself wasn't permantly injured but...I felt a very quiet sorrow that settled somewhere in my chest when I realized what it meant.

We never made it to the show - and while Noah had shattered an ankle, he could still play. The show would go on without me, I went home, an uneasy truce drawn between my brother and Beth, a heavy cloud over my head that didn't lift, even when ensconced in our bed with the whispered reassurances that the loss wasn't my fault, that in time we'd try again.

It wasn't that I didn't want to do that with her, for her - it was the thought of doing it again, the same way that made me want to scream defiance.

But I knew how emotionally fragile Beth was and for the time being, forebore from telling her that I'd be willing to do anything but that, not again. It had hurt not my body so much, though there had been that, too, but my mind. I was starting to think I still wasn't over the sheer shock of the whole thing.

I tried, in my own way, to suggest we do something slightly different, something not so...well, it didn't matter. Beth was convinced that it was beautiful, that it would be fine, and

I started to cut myself again in places that wouldn't be seen when Beth wasn't home, and once the cast was fully off, I stopped eating.

Con Part IX

Those were perhaps the most perfect days, those few days, that Beth and I ever had, the wonderful, beautiful us I'd always known we could be.

The night before I left, for the first time, Beth cried, not for sorrow nor for rage, but for love, a love I could feel with every part of my being, when she came on me, in me, verbalized the wonder she felt when my body tightened and pulsed around her and when we finally slept, she still rest within me.

"I love you, JayJay," she whispered into my neck and held me close with gentle desperation, the same way she'd made love. "I love you and our baby."

The ride to Rhode Island passed in a blur of high spirits about the gig - and anxiety about the gig - but the four of us balanced each other well, and Noah was almost as careful as Beth in reminding me to drink enough water, eat another something or other.

Noah reached behind the bench in the double row van that held us and our equipment and when he turned back around with a bottle of water in hand, his eyes widened before he lunged forward to grab me and tuck me under him.

Then the world flipped on its back with a sharp, brilliant blasting howl...before it turned silent, warm, and black.

Con VIII

"Aw, honey," he said after placing a warm arm across my shoulders and handing me a blue handkerchief of softened cotton to wipe my face with, "you gonna be okay - you just focus on you, on your melody, baby, breathe into your rhythm - you'll be alright, you'll find your way."

Somehow after talking with Noah, things did seemed to get better, I felt better and as we got closer and closer to the departure date, I cut myself less, ate more, started paying attention to Beth's attentions until one day, about three days before "D-Day" (she called it that because she wasn't thrilled about my going) I felt it, that sense, that knowing: Beth and I were going to have a baby.

For the first time, since I'd been officially told, even after having gone through the first few months, I knew it for myself: I was no longer simply "me," but for a little while, I was an "us;" me and this little thing that was growing under my skin, under my heart...a part of us both.

The how it happened...I couldn't think about, I couldn't let it bother me, because the expression on Beth's face and the way she held my hand as together we listened to that rapid little heart beat that filled the room through the speaker and watchted it, pulsing and alive on the monitor in black and white, made it all worthwhile.

Con VII

It was Noah, Noah Jole, the saxophone player who noticed first.

Beth wanted to tell everyone, but I didn't and for the first time, as far as I could tell, she respected my wishes.

I also didn't want to see my parents or my older brother, didn't want to go out, didn't speak with any of our friends - I'd even stopped giving private lessons - something I'd been doing to earn my daily bread since I was sixteen, while the only reason I dragged myself to rehearsals was because I'd fought so hard to become a part of the jazz combo I now played with - and we were scheduled to go on tour in less than a month - not a large one, to be certain, but it was an important one: we would headline one of the stages at the Rhode Island Jazz fest, then go to Chicago for a BB King tribute.

I didn't understand it, my feelings, either. Beth was perfect, everything I'd always hoped, everything I knew she, no, we could be and more...we were a family...and my career had just taken a very positive turn.

Beth humored my moods and told me it was all a part of the process my body was undergoing and my gp - the one she'd picked - apparently agreed.

One late afternoon, after she'd dropped me off at the local concert stage we rehearsed at, Noah eyed me as he polished the brass of his instrument, the soft chamois rag a caress over the creature he loved to the exclusion of most of the world.

I sat on my stool and tuned my guitar, plucking at the nylon and silver strings, checking the intonation.

"When you due?" he asked me in a soft undertone.

I stared at him.

"C'mon, girl," he said, his voice teasing, rich, and low, "I've got three sisters, two daughters, and three grandbabies. You think I can't see you there, the baby marks all over you? And Beth," he said, and rolled his eyes, "isn't she just so proud? Fussin' over you like...she's..." he put his sax down on the stand and put a hand on my shoulder. "What's the matter, honey? Ain't you happy?"

And much to my horror, I realized the answer even as I tried not to shake my head.

No. I wasn't - not at all.