Funny Guest Writer

My Guest Blogger: Aspiring author and nerve-shot attorney, Stephen Piccola (We've been friends ever since we met at a writer’s conference.)

12:30 Am. Quiet and calm are master of the street. I will step out and retrieve some papers from my car and savor the dark peace on the way. A distant train horn blows at this time nightly, more relaxing than a dozen sighs.

Yet other tones sound at this time. "Be vigilant," the phantom voice tells me and I heed it well, for it has served me on highways and in courtrooms before.

I look ahead then to the right. Only the houses and trees which exist in the day but are now standing in night's muted colors. Then I look to the left. 

 My feet become solidified with the concrete. My eyes become huge ovals behind my glasses. My breath stops. Between the beats of my heart eons, no ages would fit unnoticed.    

Skunk! Thy name is anathema. Skunk! Shunned eternal by all but its own. Skunk! Repugnant even to Satan, whose cunning chose snake form instead. Skunk! In my own drive way, poised ready to render my cars whole but more contaminated than a dozen Chernobyls. Black and white and big and right in my driveway where I would have trod save for my protector voice.  

I remain frozen, but the me that is in me but not of me moves towards the house. I see myself closing the front door as if it is happening in a movie. I realize a million snapshots with only me in them had passed before my eyes while I backed into the house.

I wait for the stench that cannot be stated to come but it does not. I collapse on a sofa and spill sobs of joy.  

Stephen is working on his historical fiction manuscript called Infamy’s Eve which starts out on October 3, 1941 in the Imperial Navy General staff headquarters. The first line is, “What you want me to do is commit treason.” Talk about pulling a reader into a story. I can’t wait for it to be finished!

Stephen does not have a blog but he’d love to hear your comments!