Reason, I told myself, is a compliment wrapped in a lie. To lure Kara’s talented gardener’s hands into my yard, I’ve committed myself to this new friendship, while my yard takes on an attractive shape. In truth, Kara talks too much at the most inappropriate times, and constantly clicks her tongue against her teeth. The irritating sound a perfect match to a lovelorn bird in heat.

I counted myself quite cleaver to invite Kara for tea and dainty cucumber sandwiches in my shabby backyard. The tangle of honeysuckle all but strangled the porch rail, a limp pink dogwood tree, an overgrown purple rhododendron, and had begun to encroach on the small iron table and matching chairs, laden with the lunch for my honored guest. The yard at least smelled wonderfully sweet, to the point of nauseousness.

The pain in his eyes tugged at my heart and tore the lining in a soft spot worn thin from worry. Over night, his face had become sunken and shapeless, like the bones had been eaten away by the cancer in his body. Each day grew harder for both of us.

He sipped the homemade chicken broth I brought, wincing each time he swallowed. Not one part of him didn’t hurt. Not one part of me didn’t hurt with him.

If Mrs. Goldstein had wanted the last salmon at Fishel’s Fish Market she should have spoken up and claimed it. Instead, she bit her fingernail with indecisive vigor and cautiously adumbrated a years worth of dinner meals. The salmon wouldn’t stay fresh forever. It’s watery, bulging eyes would turn dry and sunken. It’s wet and shiny body would soon wrinkle and become dull.

Mr. Fishel rocked back and forth on his heels and wrung his hands together, one, two, three times. With each tick of the clock on the wall his smile stretched thin, like soup made to accommodate company.

The old man had lived at the end of the road in the three story Italian villa all his life. Many have dubbed him the eremite; a religious recluse who orders his world as he pleases inside the walls of his private estate.

In Katray’s thirteen years as a neighboring resident, she’d not gotten so much as a glimpse of him. Today, she would rectify the situation and soothe her curiosity hinged to her recent confusing dreams. She embarked from her moderate home nestled at the mouth of the road, and clutched a plate of lemon bars. She intended to introduce herself, hand him the fresh bake goodies, and study the old man with a long ample gaze. He would have to take the lead from there.

“I lied.” Marge sat unaware she twisted the tissue in her hands. “For the past six months my life’s been so far from normal you need a strong powered telescope to spot me dangling beyond the edge of the earth’s surface.”

Saddie offered her best friend another tissue. “Why didn’t you say something sooner?”

“I wanted to wait until things improved, so I’d have something positive to say, but things just keep getting worse. Every time I thought things might be getting better and I prepared to release my breath and relax a little, something new developed and I’d paused with breath held again.” Marge wiped at a fallen tear.

Every time I see a quarter horse with one white sock I think of Susie, then I remember how we met and start laughing. How many women can say they met their best friend in the men’s bathroom?

I couldn’t wait in the long line marked ‘Women’s.’ Instead, I had dashed into the men’s bathroom. Seconds later another girl followed behind me.

I smiled. “Alright, a kindred spirit.”

Sally sipped tea, ate thick slices of zucchini bread, and read her latest romance novel in the comfort of a cushioned lounge chair under a broad umbrella. To some it may seem silly to take a vacation in the middle of winter in your backyard, but Sally thought it was perfect. Well, almost perfect, if thirty degree temperatures didn’t bother you. Old ski boots, a snowsuit, gloves, down coat with hood, two wool scarfs, and a wool blanket took care of the cold weather. She called this phase of her vacation, ‘Testing The Water.’ With languid snowflakes falling, maybe a more appropriate title would be ‘Testing The Temperature.’

Fear played dark notes in Baylin’s mind and froze her thoughts against all rational thinking. If time sped up or slow down, what difference would it make? The anxiety would still be present. The push to escape, take charge, break free of the bonds and chains demanding complete control, fought a weak battle in their plight to break down the heavy door marked panic.

Trapped in the silent ceremony of predawn anxiousness, Baylin pulled her eyes opened and raised herself from the bed. She glanced at her husband wrapped in blankets. Contentment smoothed his face. She longed for possession of the same restful peace.

“Kylie, I’m not apologizing and this is the last time I’m talking to you about it.” Kinnerly’s past promise to change her ethical values vanished. In it’s place her sharp tone shot through the phone line and snapped in my ear.

Kinnerly has always been difficult, nasty, even deceitful. Now that I’ve been turned over to a collection agency, because of her neglectful management of my share of the money for the overseas tour she arranged, I want nothing more to do with her. She’s pushed my temper beyond the boiling point. Her mercenary attitude has curdled every inch of this long anticipated vacation, due to begin in three weeks. The woman is impossible to deal with, but I’m stuck, and find myself at her mercy. She’s got to correct her error and set my account straight or my credit will be ruined.

Tia ran a finger over the smooth surface of the chiseled words. Not one sharp edge. A testament and complimentary showcase of Grandpa’s life. Grandma would have thought Grandpa’s epithet sacrilegious, and right this minute was probably scolding him once more inside their shared plot for his tiring and continuous raillery. He believed God had enlarged his tease gland to twice the normal size and Grandpa fashioned the reason around his optimistic personality. Grandpa took ownership of the claimed gift and made it his life’s mission to help others push a grin onto their anguish filled faces, or draw a smile across their hard set lips, or expel a trickle of found laughter hidden behind a heart of cold stone.

Karen’s anxious and excited footfall rushed through gate 243 of the Phoenix airport. Her first flight in twenty-five year left her stomach jumpy, but this first flight alone had added a colony of nervous swells too. She knew her world would calm down the moment she spotted Teri Lynn.

Two years and a lifetime of changes had taken place since the best friends last saw each other. Karen clutched her handbag and scanned the huge room. Teri Lynn told Karen she’d lost two dress sizes and had let her hair grow long.

Sara gripped her Bible with both hands and entered the old man’s room. Warm, stale air hit her lungs. Semi-darkness momentarily reduced her visibility. Labored breath squeezed from his chest and competed with each tick of the Seth Thomas wall clock. A solid signal the end of his life stood in the checkout line.

Not one visitor had come since his arrival weeks earlier. She drew in a long, silent breath, let it out slow, formulating a warm greeting. “Good afternoon. I’m Sara Winthrop. I thought you might enjoy a short visit.”

Minka woke with a start. Her thoughts wound through her memory gathering and piecing a distant recollection back together. Spiked with a heavy dose of adrenaline, she slipped from her bed clad in a calculated plan, wrapped in silent ceremony. Stealth footsteps took her to the cedar chest at the foot of her bed. Nimble fingers withdrew the quilt buried at the bottom. She clutched the forgotten gift to her chest.

I had waited for this day for weeks. The hard bench underneath me fought to steal my concentration, but I had come to hear my favorite author speak and I wasn’t going to let anything rob me of this treasured pleasure.

She walked across the stage to the podium in tempered self-assurance and grace. A model portrait of modest humility, and a natural aura woven within her personality.

Her soft words floated through the air like eloquent pastel strokes, not big and thunderous, but dainty and gentle. Each syllable weighed and measured. Nothing extra or unbalanced. You knew her thoughts and memories were precise and exact before she brought them out and shared them.

Lauren is my best friend. I’ve know her most of my life and she’d do anything for me. But I’d never gone to the movies with her until yesterday. How could I know she’d be one of those loud, annoying talkers. The wag of her tongue, her whole body for that matter, asking questions and making comments and gestures through both movies, my first double feature, coiled my last nerve into a tight spring. I had to grip my chair, equal testosterone-laced force, to keep myself from jumping up and finding a quiet seat somewhere else.

My Mama’s oldest sister, Aunt Nova Kane, graced us with a short, unannounced visit each spring. “I’m here once again, fulfilling my duty call,” she meticulously announced, with her head held high to extract an extra inch from her zaftig frame. Even in her low heels, Mama’s slim and graceful carriage stood taller.

Aunt Nova Kane pretended to ignored the fact that I now surpassed her height too, and marched behind Mama into the kitchen with her permanent scowl in place. I suppose being married to a dentist could have induced her paralyzed expression, but Mama said she came by it naturally at birth and has never fashioned any desire to trade it for a smile.

"Excuse me ma'am, can you tell me how to get to the freeway?"

The woman eyed the man who accosted her. He was disheveled, ragged, and a little dirty. He looked like one of the panhandlers who hung out at the exit ramps. She was visibly discomfited by his presence. "I'm sorry. I'm still rather new here and don't quite know myself," she lied.

The man moved down the parking lot and approached a woman pushing a cart of groceries. "Excuse me ma'am, can you tell me how to get to the freeway?"

Annie spied the recently hung antique plate on my wall. “It was given to my grandmother on her wedding day and she passed it on to me on my wedding day. I’ve kept it tucked away for years. It’s not worth a lot of money, but it’s sentimental value is priceless. I love it’s bright pink color. The same intensity as Ashlynn’s baby cheeks flushed from giggles and laughter,” I smiled at the remembrance of my daughter as an infant.

I don’t believe it. The ladies of the Woman’s Church league have gone mad.

Betty Logan marched to the front of the reception room and accepted the gavel as the newly installed president like the honor had always belonged to her. The over-controlling woman magnified her compact girth with a brisk tone and clipped ending to each word. Put her in pants and you could be staring at the next Hitler, minus the mustache, although I’m not so sure she couldn’t grow one.

Bepa sat on the back porch in the old rocker. All the life simply drained out of her body and concentrated in her eyes. She scanned the fir tree dotted land like someone from her youthful past planned to march over the hillside, scoop her into his arms, and take her away. I knew that look. I’d seen it and heard the statements that always followed many times.

“My Charlie is out there. Our timing has never been right . . . but he’s coming for me, and I shall be gone, taken in a swift wink, from this patch of earth. A top soil filled with man’s limitless toil and misery, bound with the stain of his numerous sins buried deep in the dark, musty trenches underneath, to a place beyond imagined hope and matchless glory.” She spoke with a blend of obsessiveness stirred with complete trust and honesty, making invidious comparison between life and death, and I believed her.