October and November

 

Welcome to the Spot Writers. This month’s prompt is to write a story involving one or more of the following: a pumpkin, a cold wind, rustling leaves, a scarecrow, candy wrappers, someone in costume. This weeks offering comes from the pen of Phil Yeats

 

In September 2026, Phil published Follow the Hearse, the fourth book in his Barrettsport Mysteries, a series of soft-boiled mysteries set in a fictional South Shore, Nova Scotia town. For information about this book and all his others, visit his website: https://alankemisterauthor.wordpress.com/.

 

October and November

by Phil Yeats

 

I rather like October with all its colourful leaves.
The reds and golds, the browns and oranges.
The days are pleasantly cool
with few, if any, frosty nights.
And Halloween, my favourite celebration of the year.
Kids, some so small they can barely walk,
all dressed in costumes, some simple, some not.
The prize in my house went to a matching pair
dressed as Loraxes from Dr. Seuss.
A scarecrow came second.
Yes, October is a month I rather enjoy.

 

I can’t say as much for November.
I wake to smashed pumpkins on sidewalks
that I feel compelled to clean up.
And all the Halloween decorations that must come down
after just one day of splendid adoration.
Then, the rustling leaves land on pathways and lawns.
Colours not so appealing when I’m raking them up.
And all the candy wrappers I must separate
or the recycling Gestapo descends on me.
The winds are colder, the nights, frostier.
I can no longer pretend winter
isn’t around the corner.
Plenty of reasons for preferring October over November.
Need I say more?

 

***

 

The Spot Writers:

Val Muller: http://www.valmuller.com/blog/

Catherine A. MacKenzie: https://writingwicket.wordpress.com

Phil Yeats: https://alankemisterauthor.wordpress.com/

Chiara De Giorgi: https://chiaradegiorgi.blogspot.com/

 

Humphrey

Welcome to The Spot Writers. The prompt for this month is to write a story involving one or more of the following: a pumpkin, a cold wind, rustling leaves, a scarecrow, candy wrappers, someone in costume.

Cathy’s writings have been published in over four hundred print and online publications. Check out her website (www.writingwicket.wordpress.com) for more information.

 

***

 Humphrey

by Catherine A. MacKenzie

 

October dusk was just descending over Stoneridge Valley in Oakmere County. Caleb pulled his wool collar higher, almost covering his mouth. The cold wind swept across the fields and swatted the branches of the spruce and pine trees. The maples along the treeline dropped their last leaves, adding more colour to the ground.

He groaned and shifted the crate in his arms. Inside sat the season’s final harvest—a magnificent pumpkin, unusually deep orange and heavy enough that his arms were aching.

Ahead, at the edge of the cornfield, stood Humphrey.

Humphrey, fashioned from an old plaid flannel shirt, frayed denim overalls, and a burlap sack head filled with straw, had watched over the field since late September. He had been a familiar fixture of the farm for several years, though his clothing might, on occasion, change. In the dimming twilight, when breezes caught the hems of his sleeves, his straw arms swayed limply, flapping back and forth like a wet long-sleeved shirt pinned to a clothesline.

A noise caused Caleb to stop near the edge of the stalks. He balanced the crate against his knee and glanced down. Tucked in the mud near the scarecrow’s wooden post were several foil candy wrappers flickering in the fading light.

“Dratted kids,” Caleb muttered, his breath forming a puff of white. “I warned them to stay out of here.”

Another rustle came from deep within the withered corn stalks—louder than the autumn leaves darting across the path.

“Who’s there?” Caleb called, his voice swallowed instantly by the breeze.

The stalks parted. A small figure, wearing a purple velvet cloak adorned with silver stars, stepped out. Beneath the slightly crumpled pointy hat hung a painted plastic mask with a wide grin.

A young neighbour boy, Caleb figured, testing his Halloween costume two nights early.

The child, gripping a yellowed pillowcase, eyed Caleb for a moment before turning toward the scarecrow. As he moved, the old pillowcase rustled with the distinctive sound of wrapped candy.

Humphrey’s burlap face stared blankly despite his red-stitched smile. Then, a gust of wind blew between them, bending the corn stalks and sending a fresh wave of dry leaves swirling around their feet. When the wind died down, Humphrey’s straw arm whipped upward, pointing a long finger toward the pumpkin in Caleb’s arms.

The boy in the cloak giggled and pointed back at the scarecrow. “He says that one’s the king of the patch,” he whispered, his voice muffled by the mask. “He wants it.”

Caleb looked down at the massive pumpkin and then back at the boy. “He—he wants it?” He glanced at Humphrey before facing the boy again. His arms tightened around the crate.

“Yes, he wants it,” the boy said. A second later, he lifted the heavy orange globe straight out of the crate—as easily as if it were a hollow shell—and placed it on the wooden platform at Humphrey’s feet like an offering. Caleb blinked, staring at the empty crate, unable to recall the weight leaving his aching hands.  

“It belongs to him now,” the child said, stepping back into the dried leaves. “We must go.” He turned and disappeared back into the dark cornfield.

Caleb followed.

***

 The Spot Writers:

Val Muller: http://www.valmuller.com/blog/
Catherine A. MacKenzie: https://writingwicket.wordpress.com
Phil Yeats: https://alankemisterauthor.wordpress.com
Chiara De Giorgi: https://chiaradegiorgi.blogspot.com/

 

Where’s Hammy?

Welcome to the Spot Writers. This month’s prompt is to write a story involving one or more of the following: a pumpkin, a cold wind, rustling leaves, a scarecrow, candy wrappers, someone in costume.

Today’s tale comes to us from Val Muller, author of the kidlit series Corgi Capers. She is drawing a corgi a day over on social media. You can follow at facebook.com/corgicapers or find Val Muller on Instagram at Instagram.com/mercury_val.

 

Where’s Hammy?

by Val Muller

 

The leaves rustled on the darkened sidewalk as another porch light switched off. The older kids were skipping home, where their dad waited, and I stayed behind to wait for little Beth and her Aunt Julia. Julia was carrying Beth’s bulging candy bag, and Beth skipped down the sidewalk, swinging her arms wildly, obviously high on sugar, one of her hamster ears flopping crookedly down toward her chin.

“Julie, how much candy did you give the three year old?” I asked.

“Lots!” Beth said, grabbing the bag from her aunt and peering in to show me. Then she gasped. “Where’s Hammy?” The nightmarish question in the high-pitched toddler voice echoed of a scene from a horror film. All that was needed was a dolly zoom shot: the toddler, the leafy sidewalk, the missing hamster.

All would not be well.

I looked up at my sister. “Where’s Hammy?”

“Hammy?” she asked. “It was just us.”

“Yeah, it was you and Bethy and…”

“Hammy!” Beth said.

“Oh. You mean the stuffed animal.” Julie looked around calmly. Childless, she clearly did not understand the gravity of the situation.

A cold wind rustled more leaves on the sidewalk. “Mommy, I’m tired,” Beth said, lifting her arms to me. I picked her up, and she snuggled in, but we both knew something was wrong. “I need Hammy and then let’s go home to bed.” She did not yawn. There would be no yawns until Hammy was found.

“Um, I’m sure she’s here somewhere,” Julie said.

“Hammy’s a boy,” I reminded her.

“I mean, he. He’s around here somewhere.” She forced a laugh.

A group of kids ran toward us, then stopped a few feet away. “Look, candy!” they called, pointing to the ground. They all dove to pick up a candy wrapper that turned out to be empty. Unfazed, they tossed the wrapper and continued on.

“Did you see a hamster?” I called, picking up the trash.

They did not answer. One of the boys, this one wearing a reaper costume, picked up a Jack-o-lantern from the end of a driveway and tossed it into the street. It splattered, the battery-powered candle illuminating the pumpkin guts on the pavement. The kids laughed maniacally and turned down a street, their laughter echoing like demons through the emptying night. Halloween was quickly degenerating. There would be nothing else tonight except mischief, and tomorrow there would be only pumpkin guts and Christmas sales everywhere.

I was getting annoyed.

I should have warned Julie. Hammy is the thing. The thing you can’t lose. The universe. The everything.

“Hammy is like Linus’s blanket,” I blurted.

Julie stopped short. “Oh.”

Silence. We had both grown up on Charlie Brown. Now she knew.

“Where’s Hammy?” Beth whispered. Tears were close. The sugar was the only thing preventing a breakdown, and that crash was imminent.

“We’ll find him,” I said. Heat prickled my neck despite the cold wind. I knew we needed a backup Hammy, but we were waiting for a Black Friday sale. That would come too late.

For tonight, we had to find him.

Beth was known to put Hammy in all manner of places. He’s been in our mailbox, he’s been in her clubhouse outside until midnight, he’s been in carseats and in trunks, in toyboxes and even in the fridge once. He’s been strapped to a swing in a park, and luckily many merciful souls left him alone until we came back for him. But tonight—the kids tonight were full of mischief. They were likely to tear Hammy apart or roast him in a lit Jack-o-lantern. We had to find him before the hellions.

Hammy likes to push buttons on elevators and doorbells, he likes to look in piles of leaves, he likes to climb trees. Hammy has been found in all manner of places, and tonight, everyone’s yards were like cluttered attics, with Halloween décor and Autumn leaves everywhere.

I glanced at the neighborhood.  Another porch light turned off. It was after 9, and it seemed even the houses sensed it was time to shut down for the night. This was the quiet part of Halloween night, the spooky part, the part where the summer months clock out and the cold, dark months take their turn.

I shivered. “Let’s go backwards. When do you remember having Hammy?”

Beth jumped out of my arms. “He was everywhere! We got so, so much candy.” She started to babble about all the kinds of candy she got, but I took her hand and walked with Julie back down the street.

We searched leaf piles, we searched inside witch’s cauldrons, we searched inside mailboxes. Nowhere.

A lone group of adults was having a fire pit in their driveway. “Want a s’more?” they asked.

I gave in. The warmth, the friendliness. If I just sat there, maybe Hammy would just materialize. To sit somewhere warm, to have someone hand me something delicious without me having to make it or think about it…

In two seconds flat, Beth was covered in sticky chocolate and marshmallow. “This is yummy!” she squealed.

At least the sugar would delay her meltdown another few minutes.

The couple made small talk – they were cousins of the house’s owners, staying for the long weekend. “You don’t get much wholesomeness in these parts, do you?” one of them asked. Turns out, they were from the Midwest. They weren’t used to the cutthroat lifestyle some places on the East Coast can force upon you. I wondered whether we made the right call, taking the jobs we did and staying in the east.

“Look, now Hammy can have a s’mores too!” Beth shouted. She pointed to a giant scarecrow display in the middle of the lawn. The scarecrow was holding one of those orange trick or treat pumpkin buckets, and sure enough, Hammy was peeking out over it, watching the whole thing. Julie and I smiled at each other and finished our s’mores.

After a quick wipe-down, the toddler cuddled the missing friend in her arms. As I picked her up for the walk home, she yawned, the sugar rush peacefully leaving her body. It was the dark time of night, the cozy time, and we were all due for a good rest.

*

The Spot Writers:

Val Muller: http://www.valmuller.com/blog/
Catherine A. MacKenzie: https://writingwicket.wordpress.com
Phil Yeats: https://alankemisterauthor.wordpress.com
Chiara De Giorgi: https://chiaradegiorgi.blogspot.com/

 

 

 

 

 

One Globe, Many Worlds

Welcome to The Spot Writers. The prompt for this month is to write something that features a globe. This week’s contribution comes from Chiara De Giorgi. Chiara is an Italian author and currently lives in Berlin, Germany. She writes fiction, with a focus on children’s literature and science fiction.

 

One Globe, Many Worlds

by Chiara De Giorgi

 

created with Canva

In hindsight, my adventures could be placed somewhere between Alice Through the Looking-Glass and Jumanji. It all started when I found a small globe in a thrift store, while looking for an old dress to wear for Halloween.

The globe wasn’t very big; let’s say it was about the width of my palm. What captivated me were the colors: the blue of the oceans shimmered as though it were made of waves; the satin gold of the deserts made the sand seem to glisten in the sun; the green of the forests was so vivid I could almost smell the vegetation; and the polar ice caps looked so white I could have sworn they were made of real ice.

I couldn’t leave the shop without the globe, and I didn’t. The shop assistant wrapped it in tissue paper and put it in a bag. I paid and left. It wasn’t until I got home that I realized I’d forgotten to pick up the costume for the Halloween party.

Oh, well. I’d just stay home and enjoy my globe.

I carefully unwrapped it and placed it on the table beside the couch, then sat and stared at it. Holding it steady with one hand resting on its axis, I gently spun it with the other.

The shimmering colors blurred, and I was mesmerized. I’d never seen an object that could hold my attention like that. I simply couldn’t look away…

Trying to snap out of my trance, I placed my hand on the globe to stop it. That’s when I was sucked inside.

 

I landed softly in the sand. The sky above me was an intense blue, the sun a merciless white-hot circle, and golden-red sand stretched endlessly in every direction. I was still trying to make sense of what had happened. My first instinct was to assume I’d fallen asleep while staring at the globe and was now dreaming. Then, a human silhouette appeared in the shimmering distance.

The man, wrapped from head to toe in a tan-colored robe, was leading a dromedary. He approached me and stopped a few steps away. Then he uncorked a water bottle and handed it to me.

Grateful and speechless, I accepted it and took a few sips.

“Have you just arrived?” he asked.

I nodded, still confused about where, exactly, I’d arrived, and how I’d got there.

“Good,” he said. “Then you can help me.” He pointed towards the horizon. “See the oasis?”

I squinted. Yes, I could make out something, far off in the distance, that broke up the uniformity of the sand’s color. I nodded.

“I’ve been trying to reach it for a hundred years. According to legend, only a stranger from afar can make it possible to reach the oasis.”

“A hundred years?” I asked, skeptical.

He gave me a look that suggested I wasn’t the first stranger to ask that question.

“Come. We don’t have much time.”

I followed him across the dunes for what felt like hours. The blue line never seemed to get any closer.

Then the wind rose, the sky turned the color of copper, and a sandstorm was suddenly upon us. The dromedary bolted. The man grabbed my arm and dragged me toward a dark shape emerging from the dunes: the ruins of a stone building, half buried in the sand. We barely made it inside before the storm swallowed everything around us.

When the wind finally died, I crawled out into a landscape that had been completely rearranged. The dunes were gone. Before us lay a valley filled with palm trees, and at its center, a pool of water.

The man fell to his knees. For a moment, I felt I ought to say something profound. Instead, I said, “Well. That’s rather lovely.”

He laughed, and the sound seemed to release a hundred years of longing.

“Why was it so important for you to reach this pond?” I asked.

The man pointed at the pool of crystal-clear water. The surface was still, except for a small circular ripple at its center. Within it, a familiar blue-and-gold sphere emerged.

“Is that… my globe?”

The man just stared silently at it.

“Wait…” I said, a scenario forming inside my head, at the same time totally crazy and yet somehow plausible. “Did you arrive here a hundred years ago and get stuck because you needed the globe to go back?”

He didn’t answer.

“Do I need to stay here to allow you to go back?” I whispered.

This time, he burst out laughing.

“Not at all! It’s not a Charon’s kind of situation,” he said, still amused. “I wanted to stay. I just didn’t expect it would take so long to be able to go back.”

I smiled. “What about your dromedary?”

The man removed harness and saddle from the dromedary, stroked its muzzle, and whispered a few words in its ear. The dromedary nudged his arm, then set off on its own, marching slowly across the dunes toward the horizon.

“Shall we?” he asked.

We both reached toward the globe and touched it. A moment later, we were in my living room.

 

That was my first adventure. There were many, many others. Some I shared with the man from the desert; some were lonely enterprises, and one involved a very irritable serpent, if you can believe it.

Stories for another time.

Now it’s time for me to let the globe go. I’ve wrapped it carefully, just as the shop assistant did, and taken it to a thrift store across town. Perhaps someone will find it while looking for an old dress to wear for Halloween. I do hope they like adventures.

  

The Spot Writers:

Val Muller: http://www.valmuller.com/blog/

Catherine A. MacKenzie: https://writingwicket.wordpress.com

Phil Yeats: https://alankemisterauthor.wordpress.com/

Chiara De Giorgi: https://chiaradegiorgi.blogspot.com/

Our Beautiful Blue Planet

Welcome to The Spot Writers. The prompt for this month is to write something that features a globe. This week’s story, a poem, comes from the pen of Phil Yeats.

In September 2026, Phil published Follow the Hearse, the fourth book in his Barrettsport Mysteries, a series of soft-boiled mysteries set in a fictional South Shore, Nova Scotia town. For information about this book and all his others, visit his website: https://alankemisterauthor.wordpress.com/.

 

Our Beautiful Blue Planet

by Phil Yeats

 

Since spacemen first breached gravity’s embrace,

we’ve imagined a blue sphere

with wisps of white and green

suspended in an inky black void.

 

It’s a chimera—

an impossible dream we’ll never achieve.

 

Our reality is a world mired in chaos,

heading for a tipping point we may not survive.

Keep that picture of our beautiful blue globe in mind—

it may soon be nothing more than a whispered memory.

 

 

The Spot Writers:

Val Muller: http://www.valmuller.com/blog/
Catherine A. MacKenzie: https://writingwicket.wordpress.com
Phil Yeats: https://alankemisterauthor.wordpress.com/
Chiara De Giorgi: https://chiaradegiorgi.blogspot.com/

 

Anti-anxiety things I’ve been doing

 

 ANTI-ANXIETY THINGS I'VE BEEN DOING 

·         Open my physical mail 1-2 days after I get it.

It’s all bills, bureaucratic, or administrative stuff anyway, and it doesn’t make a difference whether I know right now or tomorrow. This trick gives me power over my time back. It gives me the chance to learn what the matter is when I’m mentally prepared to address the issue. It says to the “thing”: my time and my peace of mind are more important than you. And it removes me from the “rush” mentality, where everything must be dealt with NOW. The fact is, there will ALWAYS be something demanding my attention. It’s never, “let’s get this over with so I can focus on myself later.” It doesn’t work like that because by the time I’m done dealing with this thing and the ones that inevitably follow, I have no energy left to focus on myself. The truth is, no one is dying if I don’t open this letter right here right now. So, the letter will wait until I decide it’s time to open it.

·         Set my phone on “do not disturb” when I’m doing something and I don’t want to be interrupted.

A couple very selected numbers can “disturb” me any time (and they usually don’t!). Everyone else can and will wait. Wait until this work is finished, wait until my reading time is over, wait until I get out of the gym, wait until my time with this friend is over, when I’m finished eating, done with the laundry… there is no hierarchy of activities, and what I wholeheartedly devote my time to is my business and mine alone; no one gets to judge whether something is too trivial for me to postpone replying to a text. If and when I want to focus on something or someone, it’s my choice and I am going to protect it. It’s NEVER a matter of life and death anyway. And honestly, no one is entitled to my time; I really don’t have to drop everything at any given time to reply to texts or phone calls. I’ll get to it when it suits me (just as the sender/caller texted or called me when it suited them, by the way). The “urgent” things that need to be done “by yesterday” are not real.

·         Spend my time on something that is not profitable.

Not everything must be a commodity, not everything must be converted into money. Time is NOT money. I can take time to just be in nature, read a novel, crochet silly things, play with my cats, sleep.

 

What has all this accomplished?

I feel more in charge of my time and my life. I don’t feel guilty anymore for “wasting time” doing “unaccountable” stuff. My attention is not split over several different things/people at the same time, so when I focus on something or someone, I can give it or them my full attention. My mind feels more relaxed and peaceful. I enjoy things on a deeper level because there’s no expectation attached that they should profit me somehow. And guess what? No one has died in the meantime, especially not because I replied to a text after 3 hours. Shocking, huh?

I’m so sick and tired of this “hustle” and “fast-paced” mentality. It adds nothing to my life and actually robs it of the chance to truly enjoy it. I am the kind of person who stops walking when she sees a nice flower, a duck in the pond, a funny-looking cloud in the sky, a butterfly zigzagging through my potted plants. The kind of person who steps onto the balcony in a freezing winter night to look at the moon because it is so beautiful. The kind of person who walks farther than she needs to because there’s a wonderful sunset and she wants to find a spot where she can admire it better. I reclaim my right to spend my time on these activities without feeling guilty about not being “efficient.”

Have my problems and my worries magically disappeared since I’ve started doing all the above?

Sadly, no. But they don’t own me anymore, and it’s best to approach these things with serenity rather than with anxiety, isn’t it? As Marcus Aurelius said: The nearer a man comes to a calm mind, the closer he is to strength. And if that’s not enough, there’s a Zen proverb that says: To be calm is the highest achievement of the self.

A Flash of Magic

 Welcome to The Spot Writers. The prompt for this month is to write something that features a globe. This time, it’s Cathy MacKenzie’s turn.

Cathy’s writings have been published in over four hundred print and online publications. Check out her website (www.writingwicket.wordpress.com) for more information.

 

***

 A Flash of Magic

by Cathy MacKenzie

 

“I saw it,” I say, looking up, positive I had—if only for an instant.

“Don’t be foolish, Melissa,” Jeff says. “Stuff like that only happens in movies.”

I sigh, wanting to scream to anyone who will listen. My nearly eighteen-year-old brother doesn’t believe in anything. Not God. Not wishes or dreams. Definitely nothing make-believe. I’m skeptical at times, too, yet I’m lured in. I want to believe in miracles and magic—the things that keep us young and alive. I’ve watched our mother stare into her bedroom mirror, mourning years that passed too fast. “Don’t wish your life away, Melissa,” she tells me. “It creeps up on you, and before you know it, you’re old.” She thinks she’s starting to look like Grandma though, to me, she’s still beautiful—they both are.

The next night, I return to the woods alone, retracing my steps as I’ve done every evening since Mike died. Last night was the first time Jeff had come along. He’s hurting as much as I am, and I’d hoped he might find a sliver of the comfort I’ve found here.

The woods smell faintly of pine as if Christmas has just passed instead of my twin brother. But it’s April. Cool, but spring’s in the air, and the early evening is refreshing. The moon hangs low, illuminating the path.

Ten minutes later, I reach my destination. I sit on one of the two rounded humps on the large rock that I’d dubbed “the heart rock.” Feet away from the edge of the cliff, it’s almost as if I’m at the edge of the world. The Atlantic Ocean stretches in front of me and disappears into the horizon. Far below, waves crash violently against the rugged shoreline. Despite the roar of the surf, I’m at ease on that rock, where I’ve always felt comfortable. Even before Mike died.

This is where Mike and I used to sit and talk. It feels like another lifetime, but it’s really just one: Mike’s. A life ended in an instant. Car crashes are like that. Little warning when someone rams head-on.

“Killed instantly,” the police told our parents.

But how did they know? Who’s to say Mike didn’t linger, panting for breath, wishing for life? Did he know he was going to die?

We were close. As close as twins are: finishing sentences, reading thoughts, sharing secret smiles.

Brian, Mike’s best friend, had invited me to tag along that fateful night. Mike had told me months before that Brian had a crush on me, but I already knew.

Usually, I would’ve accepted the invite in a second. But that night? I had a bad vibe. While I tried to convince Mike to stay home, he tried to convince me to go.

“Let’s go sit on our rock instead,” I said.

He squinted at me in an odd way. I hated when he made expressions like that, as if he knew more than I did—and he didn’t. His eyes squished into narrow slits and his forehead furrowed.

“Nah, I feel like going for a drive. We’re going to grab a bite to eat. I wish you’d come with us.”

For several moments, I hesitated, wavering: should I? Mike thought I was going to back down.

I almost did. I clenched and unclenched my hands, wanting to grab him close to my chest as if he were my child even though he was inches taller than I.

Then his mood shifted. His eyes softened back to their usual blue-green.

“Never mind. You stay here. Gotta go. Brian’s waiting.” He took my hand, raised it to his lips, and pretended to kiss it as if he were a prince charming a hesitant future princess. “Love you, Mel.”

“Love you, too.”

“See ya later. We won’t be gone long.” He stayed for a few more seconds, swaying from foot to foot, almost as hesitant as that imaginary princess-to-be.

Did he know the night was doomed? Did he know he was going to die? Had he protected me in that last split second?

What would have happened had I gone? Could I have saved them? Were they busy chattering in the front seat, neither paying attention to the road? Would I have been alert in the backseat? Would I have seen the advancing semi? I like to think I would’ve screeched, “Look out! Look out!” and Brian would have veered away from the oncoming horror. Brian, at seventeen, was a year older than Mike and me. Had just gotten his driver’s license.

I wonder, too, belted in the backseat, could I have been the lone survivor? Could I have ducked? Protected my head from danger?

Pondering what-ifs is torture. Who can travel back in time to change the future or know if an outcome could have been prevented?

That night he died—before the police ever rang our doorbell—I had been sitting on our rock. At eight minutes past eight, the low moon seemed to give birth when a smaller, luminous globe emerged from its light. It drifted toward me, glowing so brightly I had to shield my eyes. My heart hammered violently against my ribs. A sudden ache of homesickness swept over me.

I had looked down at my watch: 8:08 p.m.

I sauntered home around eight-thirty. An hour later, the news came.

I’ve returned to the heart rock every night since. I arrive by 7:45, needing those few quiet minutes. Precisely at 8:08, that same shining globe appears, hovering near the ocean’s edge before veering softly toward me.

Jeff didn’t see it last night because he doesn’t believe. Besides, Mike doesn’t return for Jeff. He returns for me.

I’m the older twin. Mike was born eight minutes after me, at precisely 8:08 p.m. It was the exact time his heart stopped, too; I feel that in my heart. No one—not Mom, not Dad—realizes the significance, and I’ll never share my globe with anyone again.

I still have regrets. That night, three months ago, I should’ve donned my big-sister bonnet. I should’ve gripped my brother to my chest. I should never have let go.

 

***

 

The Spot Writers:

Val Muller: http://www.valmuller.com/blog/
Catherine A. MacKenzie: https://writingwicket.wordpress.com
Phil Yeats: https://alankemisterauthor.wordpress.com
Chiara De Giorgi: https://chiaradegiorgi.blogspot.com/