Golem

This is a chapter of my Nanowrimo work.  It may or may not stay in the final story.  It's a bit of history of my main character, Katrina Crowe.  She has a special "gift", she counsels those with supernatural afflictions.


         Richard had been her first client, and her first failure. Maybe that had been for the best. There had been a few other failures over the years, but Richard had been the worst.

He’d come to see Gram of course, but she was too sick to try to help him at that time. So he had to settle for Katie. Fortunately, he knew enough about his condition to give Katie a head start.

He was a golem, a creation made of mud, conjured by a nice widow woman to be her house man. Her husband had died very young and she'd needed someone to look after the home repairs and yard work. She didn’t trust hired help. So after some unconventional research, she found an old book that described the perfect servant and explained how to ‘make’ one of her own.

She treated him well and taught him to love beautiful things. Not just material, but natural. He also learned to love living and people.

His problem was, fifty years after she had made him, she was dying. And according to all he could find out, at her death, he would cease to exist. Though he cared for her, he wasn’t excited about his impending demise. There were still things he wanted to see, things he wanted to learn.

Katie liked Richard, he was soft spoken and well educated. She felt he did deserve to have more life and asked Gram if there was anyway to help him. Gram had looked at her sadly, and shook her head. It was the way the conjure worked. No one else could redo it. In fact, she didn’t even know if the spell Richard’s widow woman had used still existed.

Katie spent weeks going through Gram’s notebooks. She scoured the library in the city. The Internet was in it’s infancy. Google didn’t exist. There were mentions of golems in one of the oldest notebooks, but nothing useful. There were books of myth or of the sci-fi/fantasy genre, they were useless as well.  Even Richard had no idea where his maker had found the spell for his creation.

Richard told her it was alright. She’d done everything she could. 

 It didn’t make her feel any better.

The day came when the woman was taking her final breaths. What family she had was at her bedside. Richard, only being ‘the help’ was allowed to make his final good bye, then was released from his duties. He sat with Katie the rest of that day

.

She watched as he took in as much of the world as he could. It was a beautiful summer day. Flowers in bloom, the sun shining, there was even a soft breeze.

They sat outside, close to the woods, away from the sight of people. Several times she saw him shudder, and seem to become fuzzy to her. Then he sort of pulled himself together and remarked on a bird song or falling leaf.

Suddenly, he grabbed both of her hands. He looked into her eyes and smiled sadly. “Thank you, thank you for your time.”

Seconds later, her hands held only dried mud.

Ready at 8:00AM

This week I want you to take me to your version of 8:00 -AM or PM, fiction or creative nonfiction- in 200 words or less.


It's 8:00 am. The percolator sits on the counter in the kitchen, proud in it's stainless steel-ness. It waits for her to come fill it with water and load the basket with the aromatic grounds.

She doesn't show up. It must not be 8:00 am on Monday or Wednesday. It must be 8:00 am on another day. On a day when she bypasses the kitchen counter and heads off to that fancy commercial coffee machine. The machine that produces endless cups. Quenching her need for coffee well before and after 8:00 am.

It slips sadly into semi-usefulness.  Dreams of perking a pot of perfection.  Dreams of tipping a stream of clear brown wake up into her pretty cup.  Dreams of watching in pride as she closes her eyes and inhales the flavor, smiling in anticipation of the first sip.

One Meal

This week, we’ve asked you to share with us a special recipe. But, we’ve asked you to do more than just list out ingredients.

We challenged you to take us back…to take us into your memory, in 500 words or less.


My mother shuffled out to the kitchen as I was cutting slits in the hot dogs. After she had broken her hip, she relied on the fancy walker we'd gotten for her rehab. She could walk without it, but she didn't want to.

She asked what I was making.  As I folded the slices of cheese into the slits I'd cut, I told her.  Her eyes lit up.  It wasn't often I could convince her to eat enough.  She watched as I opened the tube of crescent roll dough and wrapped the cheese filled hot dogs up.

"Pigs in a blanket!  I haven't had those for so long.  That sounds wonderful!"

We'd had them often when I was growing up.  They were easy and inexpensive.  With five kids, it was a good call for working parents.

I made them when my daughter was growing up.  They were easy and inexpensive.  I worked a lot of nights, it was a good call.

I think Mom ate three or four of them that night.  She ate the leftovers for lunch the next day.

During the year we lived with her, before she died, I believe this was the meal she enjoyed most.

It was a good call.