Do you go through life wondering what people know about you?

Positively Patsy Part 21

We went back to the house Monday morning and Jake and the band showed up for lunch. We were sitting down eating, and Greg told them why he wanted to see them. “Guys, I walked off the stage in London thinking that I would be dead in a few weeks and intended never to again grace a stage.”

A response to a writers’ challenge -- "A Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day."

This is the conclusion to the interconnected Amy Amstel stories started in “My Date as a Teenage Girl Model”. If you haven’t read the earlier stories I suggest you start there (330+ Kudos clickers can be wrong but the odds are in your favor). The stories about Amy Amstel are mostly self-contained though.

Transatlantic flights seldom are fun. If you start from Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport terminal 2 you don’t exactly get off on a good start either. If you really are a bit too tired to work it’s even less fun. Flying west I try not to sleep on the flight since that really messes up my sleep-cycles. I was a bit surprised to find a scraggy teenager in the seat next to me. Not the usual passenger in first class. I decided that a long chat with the boy would be preferable to pretending to work. It didn’t start too well. When I introduced myself, Harry Howard, and told him that I was editor–in-chief of the most important fashion magazine for men the boy looked horrified. Apparently not a fashion aficionado. Well, I could have told that from his clothes. Jeans and white T-shirt as well as disheveled hair. Despite that he had a “groomed” look if you looked closer. Actually if you looked very closely he was kind of “pretty”. Shaped eye-brows, holes in his ears, just a hint of mascara remaining on those very impressive eye-lashes. Intriguing.

Positively Patsy Part 19

August, September and October we had the music school. This time we had ten very talented late teens that knew all about ‘Amazon’ and Greg’s work and were very attentive from the word go. These were all from foster homes and had shown their talents through high school bands.

The past is the past was one of the worst platitudes ever uttered by a fool trying to sound like a sage. Even if this overused cliche was not worn out, the advice in it was useless. People would use this saying to try to push an issue under the rug. Not treating the past with respect was just ignoring your life to move on. In fact, following those so-called words of wisdom had a high probability of damaging someone. An insightful person would know the best way to follow the path of Confucius was to study the past if they wanted to divine the future.

Cary learns about life at an early age, which is TFB for him.

Robber
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

What can I say? I am a criminal. It is almost as if I have never had a choice. I just like to get things the easy way. Sure, there are consequences, but the trick is to not be caught.

A young woman has everything: a home, a job, a baby, and a husband that brings her flowers.

Positively Patsy Part 17

Other things progressed while the American riders were with us. They were mainly practising the dressage portion of the sport but, seeing we already had some show jumps in store, they set them up and did some jumping practise.

Michael thinks he knows his heart's desire. Unfortunately for him, the demon he summoned seems convinced she knows better.

On My Back
A Short Story as requested by Taxidermist
By Maryanne Peters

I used to think that driving a big rig was the ultimate in freedom. The road is stretched out in front of you – this great country – where the road seems to go one forever. Hell – it does. It never stops!

Clothes
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

What woman feels comfortable about her boyfriend staring at other women? It is not just annoying, it is demoralizing. OK, so I might not be the best-looking woman, but I expect his eyes to be on me.

Positively Patsy Part 15

When he came down he looked at the hole in the wall and asked me how I had opened it and I showed him the birthmark on the stone. “I just had to push it” I told him. He stood outside the room and shone his torch inside and gave out a whistle.

Chapter 1

"MOMMY, MOMMY, MOMMY!" I heard my daughter scream. I dropped everything
and ran outside, thinking the worst. Did she fall, did she hurt herself,
did something or somebody scare her? It took me a minute to figure out
where her pleas were coming from and my panic level tripled, thinking
"Please, please, let her be safe!" Imagine my relief when I saw my
daughter hiding next to her playhouse; petrified by a tiny spider.

Muse
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

“You do believe that my work is art, don’t you,” said Claude.

“Of course, I do,” Blythe said. “And I only want to play a role in helping you to be that artist.”

And that, is the title and essence of this story.

Part 2

I woke up in the morning to the sound of a womans’ voice telling me to get out of bed and into the shower. I thought that I had been in the shower last night but obviously I was not clean enough. She told me to make sure I sat when I went to the toilet and to make sure I shaved my face twice while I was in the shower.

Sarah and Lee live a life of quiet desperation until Sarah decides to take over. Her first step is demanding that Lee buy her a lipstick.

Positively Patsy Part 11

Talk about coincidence! That will be something to speak to Ruby about. When I hung up I said “Joanne, how about we go and visit the nursing home then go and see Peter about getting a car?” We freshened up and took the sports car to the nursing home.

Camping
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

I am not sure how I came to find out about Suzy. I remember that Sam and I were talking about transgenders or something, and he just said: “I am one of those”.

Just like that. I had no idea. He was my best pal. We did everything together. It was “The Jack and Sam Show”. We had a circle, but we were our own team within the other team.

Freedomia -- land of the blessed. Fasten your seatbelts for landing.

The Jillaroo. Part 4 Love and Devotion

We married in Broken Hill with just close family with us. I had flown to his home to pick up his two brothers and had arranged for a friend to fly them home again.

The Bisley Boy
A Short Story based on Alleged Fact
By Maryanne Peters

My husband, the late Sir Thomas Parry, was a man of great importance in the household of the late Queen Elizabeth for the two years before his death. Some said that he was poorly qualified to serve as the Comptroller of the Royal Household. That may be the case. Some said that he must have some hold over Her Majesty, but I doubt that anybody could fully appreciate how momentous was the secret.