Tony W.

Awakened from a deep sleep to sounds that ears can’t factor as commonplace.

Listening deeply without stirring.

What is that?

Mentally running through every scenario of what it could possibly be.

Is everyone home?

Where are the pets?

Did they hear it, are they listening for it?

Is it the pipes, the a/c, squirls in the attic?

There it is again.

Eyes blink open of their own accord.

Nothing to be seen

WAIT

Who

What

in the hell is that?

Your asleep

You should wakeup now

Now would be a good time to wakeup

I can’t move

WHY CAN’T I FUCKING MOVE?

Hours later

In morning light

Exhausted

Shrouded in sheets

Stumbling from the bed

Half blind

The crunch of glass

A step back

there

The body of a starling

By K. Osorio-Teamer

I bought the candy too early in the month. That was my first mistake. By the time it was Halloween night, only a few mini Hershey bars were left. I shook the spider web basket hoping to materialize more candy in the process. No such luck. There’s nothing harder than having to leave the house after a long day of work. All I wanted to do was lay down on the couch wearing my pumpkin pajamas, but instead I walked out into the hot Texas sun that refused to acknowledge we were a month into fall. 

I got into my bright red car and once it was on, the ghost story podcast I was listening to on the way home picked up where I left off. A story about a possibly haunted lake at a performing arts school blurted from my speakers as I headed for the Walgreens closest to my place, happy to see no trick or treaters were walking around just yet. It was still light out, but the sun began its descent leaving behind streaks of blue, red, and orange in its place. As I approached the only entrance and exit of my neighborhood, I habitually raised my left hand to wave to one of the security guards that is parked next to the community center. My wave was left unanswered as there was no one sitting in the running car. He may have just stepped away for a moment, I told myself. I looked in my rearview mirror to be sure I didn’t just miss him. Nope, I hadn’t missed him. 

I drove until the end of the street, and looked to my left to make sure no cars were coming so I could make the right turn towards the Walgreens. I didn’t need to wait long. There were no cars from the left. I looked to the right and didn’t see any cars coming from that direction either. The only time Houston streets were this empty was during the early hours of a bank holiday or after a hurricane, and today wasn’t either of those. It was rush hour on a Monday. There should’ve been cars speeding from every direction desperate to get to their destinations. I drove slower than usual and looked in every direction. I saw cars parked, but didn’t see anyone in them. As I passed a gas station on my right, I saw cars at the pump but no one was pumping. 

I made it to the store parking lot and pulled into an open spot closest to the entrance. I watched the automatic doors, hoping to see people walking out with their purchases, but the doors remained shut. The blue and red neon sign was lit and promised me the store was OPEN. I hesitated to turn off the car, though. Something  inside – common sense – was telling me not to go in. To go home and pass out the little candy I had left, and then turn out the porch lights once the last Hershey bar was gone. Curiosity was telling me the opposite. She said to go inside and find people because shit was getting weird out here. She was very convincing. 

I turned off the car and stepped out of it, looking in all directions hoping to see someone. Anyone. The lights at the nearest intersection kept flashing between green, yellow, and red for no one. I walked towards the automatic doors and they whined open. Immediately, I looked at the registers, my gaze begging to make eye contact with an employee, but there wasn’t anyone there. My walk past the aisles turned into a slow jog as I realized there was no one there. No shoppers. No employees. Not a soul. 

Curiosity wasn’t that convincing. I ran my ass back through the doors and into my car. The streets were as empty as the new night sky. Not a star or a person in sight. My hands shook as I turned the key and shifted into reverse. That’s when I saw it in my rearview camera. A car. Driving.

I watched in awe as the red car parked in the spot to my left and turned off the motor. Gripping the steering wheel, my hands pleaded for me to pull away, but my foot ignored that smart idea and remained planted on the brake. The windows were too tinted to see who was inside the mystery car. All I could see was a blurry outline which was starting to exit through the driver side. The person stepped out and finally their head was visible above the car. They turned and the face staring back at me was far too familiar. It was me. My smiling face coming towards me was the last thing I saw before everything went black. 

By K. Osorio-Teamer

Papi was the first one to tell me about real duendes. I used to dismiss it as a kids story, a threat to keep them from running in the house or to stay close in a crowd. “The duendes will get you!” A fear that little human-like creatures, dwarves, would take you away if you roll your eyes one more time. But it was my father telling me the story this time. And it wasn’t about some unnamed neighbor in his town. 

This was his story. He had seen them. 

My father wasn’t much for practical jokes and he was too closed minded to get into Harry Potter. “It’s not even real. What’s the point?” This time he was the one bringing the supernatural into the conversation. I sat on a high stool at the bar and Papi stood in the kitchen directly across from me, wiping the beige laminate countertop with a towel. 

“Nuh-uh.” I countered astutely as I fiddled with the doily that rested under the votive candles on the bar. 

“No, no te rias,” Papi warned me not to joke around, his eyes growing wider. The smile that had spread across my face squirmed away. “It happened one night when I was on my way home from a neighbor’s house. I was young. Had to be twenty or almost twenty. I was walking out of the house onto the dirt road towards my horse. That’s when I saw it.”

“What was it doing?” I whispered.  

“It was in the dirt, in a hole.” With his eyes steadily back on that night, Papi continued, “I only saw it for a second, but it looked like a small man. He was going back in the hole and slowly filling it with dirt from the inside.” With the counter clean and my mind blown, Papi attempted to leave the kitchen. 

“Pero, Papi. And then? Did you go after it? Did you ever dig in that spot?” I followed him through the living room as he turned out the lights and checked that the front door was locked for the night. 

“Dig and do what? Go looking for magical duendes that can ruin my life? Your abuelita would’ve killed me if I got myself mixed up with duendes.” He blessed himself, kissed his hand and held it to the sky before saying goodnight and leaving me in the dark living room. 

I ran to my room as quickly as possible and slept with the closet light and TV on. The closet light was to offset the shadows that the TV made. I was thoroughly freaked out that night. I kept replaying the story in my mind and the little man filling up the whole in the dirt like some kind of mole. That quickly led to hours of debunking the story. It probably was a mole and my dad was probably a little tipsy. He was riding drunk! There was always the very slim chance that it was true. That was enough to keep me up watching Happy Days reruns.

The beautiful thing about being a kid is you can feel petrified by something one day but the next, you’ve completely forgotten about it. I was lucky enough to forget about the duendes by the next night and slept soundly. No closet light or TV necessary. 

And I slept soundly for 10 more years. That is, until last night. When I met a duende face to face.  

Tony W.

Life is short and full of surprises, especially when you factor in love. At least that’s true when it’s encountered in books and movies, then all sorts of shenanigans are had in the name of the blessed or cursed who fall under its “spell”. 

Kenneth Branagh’s “Death on the Nile” based on the Agatha Christie novel of the same name is a movie that stands out to me on several levels even above his first Agatha Christie adaption “Murder on the Orient Express”. I grew up watching David Suchet play Hercule Poirot so I thought Branagh had some pretty large shoes to fill. Branagh is a real actor as opposed to one who get parts because he’s popular, has the right looks, and/or connections, or was considered sexy in his last movie. The man has played in several adaptions of Shakespear’s plays. In other words, I wasn’t really worried about his performance and instead looked forward to what he would bring to a beloved character.

Back to “Death on the Nile” which didn’t get great reviews primarily because when it finally came out, two of its actors were in the middle of controversy and the third did some foul shite that I haven’t delved into. Let me also add here that in my opinion these three offered the weakest performances. The two ladies, Gal Gadot and Letitia Wright simply don’t have the acting acumen to stand out in this ensemble cast especially next to performers Emma Machey, Tom Bateman, Russell Brand Ali Fazal, Rose Leslie, and veterans Dawn French, Jennifer Saunders, Sophie Okonedo and Annette Bening. Okonedo and Bening are two powerhouses who even in their small roles tell us so much about their characters through gesture, looks, and body language. Emma Machey who I had to IMDB burned up the screen with her fiery looks that weren’t fully deciphered until near the end of the movie. She is a new actress I will keep an eye out for. 

So here is the real reason for writing about this movie. In the opening scene it’s 1917 and Hercule Poirot is on the battlefield. His captain has just been given orders that will decimate their ranks. Poirot the consummate observer gives them an alternative to the time frame in which to carry out their orders, thus saving their lives. However, their captain sets off a booby trap that kills him and injures Poirot. The next scene shows Poirot in a military hospital, his fiancé explains what true love is, the kind that is accepting and unconditional. Poirot then shows her his injured face. Without ever loosing eye contact she takes in his injury and contemplates her response. Her suggestion is to grow a mustache. Poirot is known for his mustache. 

This scene is important to the rest of the movie where we are given variations on the theme of what people believe to be “love”. It’s also important because the case Poirot is working on is causing him to remember his fiancé who was killed during the war and contemplate the man he has become and whether he wants or should continue on the road he is currently traveling. The thing I like about Poirot is that he knows who he is as a man and human being flaws and all. He is at this crossroads because of a blues singer named Salome Otterbourne who in the movie is played by Sophie Okonedo. Watching Poirot at a loss for words in the face of Otterbourne’s flirtations was amusing. She is a woman of the world with an understanding of human character. She seems to see him for who he is even while acknowledging his prowess as a detective. In the movie Otterbourne plays the music of Sister Rosetta Thorpe which I think says so much about what Branagh is attempting to convey through the music of the movie and the diversity of the cast.

Sidenote: The character Rosalie Otterbourne played by Letitia Wright is referred to as beautiful multiple times and it moves me each time. It is still rare to have a Black woman called beautiful in any media.

The movie is tragic, the end of my first viewing left me feeling bereaved for the characters and their loses as well as what they witnessed over a short amount of time. I went back to the film because of the promise at the end. I wanted to make sure I saw what I thought I saw and so watched it all the way through a third time. The end of the film takes place six months after the events on the Nile. We follow a man as he walks into the closed rehearsal of Salome Otterbourne. The camera moves to Salome singing and then back to the man seated in a chair. The man turns around and it is Hercule without his famous mustache.

OMG! Even on a fourth viewing I’m blown away by this ending and every interaction between Salome and Hercule. The subtlety and nuance that Okonedo and Branagh bring to their roles leaves me speechless. I want someone to make an extended clip of just their scenes together.

That’s enough from me, just watch the film.

By: IO

I have a therapist, a psychiatrist, a psychic

I have self-love workbooks and coping skills,

Box breathing techniques and ice pack compresses

I have medications and multivitamins,

An antidepressant, an antianxiety, a probiotic

I have crystals and cards,

Rose quartz and Rider Waite Smith inspirations

I have tools and I’ve had time and I am healing

Not cured, but coping

And for the first time, in a lifetime,

I do not feel like myself.

Thank fuck

by K. Osorio-Teamer

Blogger’s Note: Today I put a reminder on my calendar to write my post for the blog. When the reminder came up, I sighed in despair because I knew I didn’t know what to write or work on. The block has a hold on me. Then I read the description.

The Terrans were a small community that traveled throughout Mesoamerica. They were lovers of Earth and nature, and believed that each person was connected to all living things. The essence that lived in every person was bound to nature. In life, this essence is bound in the physical sense. The spirit experiences life through the body. In death, the spirit can experience life through nature. Through the trees, animals, water, and even fire. From the dirt beneath their feet to a light breeze or heavy wind, the Terrans believed their loved ones spoke to them from the next stage of spiritual life. Some families even devoted themselves to particular elements to ensure communication would be possible once the body was gone. These devotions were: 

Water – rain, bodies of water

Air – breath, wind, fans

Fire – flames, embers, lava, candles

Earth – soil, plants, fruits, vegetables, mushrooms

Animals – all animals, big and small, give messages

By: Tony W.

Many alien species be they mammalian, reptilian, insectoid, or some combination purr.

Aliens have large to huge penis’ on average that I’m not sure would actually fit the average human female – or maybe it just written that way.

No matter the physical size difference between a human and her alien they are always able to kiss during missionary.

The vocabulary and phrasing used over different books and authors suggest they read on another.

I wish all authors would stop using the word relish to describe how much they delight in, take pleasure in, etcetera. . . of their partner.

When species of distant worlds use American vocabulary to describe things that “can’t” be translated.

The books where humans have successfully navigated the universe successfully interacting with different species conform to many of the usual romance tropes.

The stories that use the fish out of water trope, where the heroine must learn the language and culture are some of the more interesting stories, especially when you throw in cultural misunderstandings.

Alien romances use many if not all the usual romance tropes they just happen on a different world or spaceship and with a male who is not human.

I don’t think I can state the creative worldbuilding of some authors enough. 

I’m partial to the series based on the mail-order bride trope. A human woman for all the usual reasons and some complicated ones depending on the authors creativity goes to a different planet, space station, ship, whatever to marry a non-human. In these stories we have the fish out of water, different worlds along with the possibilities for opposites attract, enemies to lovers, alpha heroes, fated mates, sunny vs grumpy and the tropes go on and on.

Normally I’m not one for series however I’ve discovered a few authors whose alien romance series are worth the time and expense. My new favorites vary from short humorous novellas to long complicated multi-configuration trope novels that rival any serious space-opera dramas and a few that fall somewhere in between. The one thing they all have in common is great world building.

By: IO

This is an open letter to the father who never learned how to be a dad. 

I don’t forgive you. And I haven’t forgotten. And most importantly, I am not sorry.

It’s just that I’m done counting the years of silence out of pride. I stopped hating you years ago, but I wasn’t ready to hear your voice. Now that I am ready, and tired of punishing myself to punish you, here’s some things you need to know. I write them for me, to guide me when I speak to you, to prevent me from regressing to the child who had silent meals with a stranger who was supposed to love me but could only show it “in his own way.” 

There was no space to love myself beside the worthlessness I took on from you. I was a burden, an unwelcome obligation, minimally met. You could not expend energy or money on me because you had a(nother) family to support. Yet the first time I offered you liberty from your bond, you rejected the opportunity. 

The second time, the time that took, I made the cut acute, if not clean. The wound is healed and scarred over, but there’s more feeling in the nerves left than I had thought. 

I needed you out of my life so I could put down the baggage that wasn’t mine. So I could stretch and rest. Those years without you I spent learning how to mend myself. I needed that time and I do not regret taking it. I’m strong enough now to hold my boundaries. 

You sounded the same, talked the same. Somehow managed to fit three attempted guilt trips into a twenty-minute conversation. I didn’t expect any different. You are the man you have always been. But I am not a child anymore. I know that I do not have to take the weight of your failure as my own. I am here for me. I am reaching out to you because I want to see if there is some benefit to having you in my life. You will never be the father I wanted, but I’m giving you another chance to do better. And if you don’t, I can walk away again. I’m stronger than I was the first time, more confident than I was the second. And I will always save myself.  

By K. Osorio-Teamer

I’m in the middle of reading Finding Me, the autobiography by Viola Davis. It’s taken me longer than anticipated to finish the book, but I shouldn’t be surprised. The friend who recommended it and even let me borrow her copy said it was uplifting to her, but that other readers disagreed. It was too heartbreaking for them.

I knew there would be trauma, but I kept thinking, “It’s Viola Davis! It’ll have a happy ending!” Well, of course there’s going to be a happy ending but I have to go through the trenches with her before we get there.

So I’m taking it a chapter at a time because I’m a crier and there’s only so many tears I can cry. This is also not the kind of book I want to read in the morning, which is when I usually read. I can’t start my day with heartbreak and abuse because I take this time to fill my cup and prepare for the day.

All in all, it’s a good but heart wrenching read that is taking me some time to finish, but will not cost me my 2022 reading goal. 10/10 Tears 😭