Riley Spencer's Short Story

He told me one last story. He used his aged, ruined voice like an old man’s hands to pick the lock on his past.

speaker’s beloved has passed away and shows how the speaker is forever affected by the

Ray Karner was a 35 year old man who shovels dead bodies into furnaces. He was the type of person who loved memories. Anything he thought was meaningful, he immediately jotted down in his diary. He had a daughter and a wife who he loved dearly. Many memories of them took up about half of his small pocket book. One after another, great days would pass by. But later he soon came to realize that things don’t always seem the way you want them to be.

Amber Riley’s husband had promised that he would come home to her no matter what, so after they reported him dead she began to keep the shotgun next to the front door. The day he returned, ambling, shambling, reeking of decay, the dog barked once in warning and went to hide under the back porch. Amber dried her hands on a dish towel and went to look at her husband through the screen.

Page 110- The tone of the old man is tired and almost regretful at the events of the past few

“These are students from Louise Spencer high school, a public school in the Central Ward”

“Hey! Come on!” When my eyes bring the world into focus, I see the face of a man. He’s looking at me with a concerned expression.

“Lily Brown”, a short story by Diane Goodman, follows the working life of a young woman with an apparent disability. Working as the voice of the short story, this young woman describes her various working positions and the numerous accounts that follow. Each job position she holds further reveals more about her internal well being, struggling with her disability.

I still remember him. He seemed to be about fifty years old, but up close, he looked about the same age as my brother, about twenty-five or twenty-six. He was carrying a few bags, probably containing his processions. When we passed him in the street, he seemed so sad, and tired, and walked slowly. We continued to walk on without much notice, but part of me could not forget him. When we reached a street corner, I looked into a tea shop, where people were getting warm after spending hours outside. My family and I went in to get some tea. I bought some hot chocolate, as my parents preferred that I not drink caffeinated beverages at that age. As we sat at the table, I glanced at a window and saw the man slowly shuffling down the street, like an elderly man with terrible arthritis. As I sipped my hot chocolate, I could not help but think to. myself, “Are there two windows that I am looking through?” In one was the warmth of the hot chocolate and in the other was the homeless man, damp, cold, with nothing to keep him warm. When we were about to leave, I though to myself, “What should I do? I cannot just sit here and allow this man to be forced into such conditions.” I asked my parents if I could buy a cup of coffee for the man,

When his parents had died he never thought he would be able to breathe again, and he almost didn't. The world became a cold place even in the warmest of months; not even moving in with his grandmother could restore him to his former glory. His hair no longer spun like gold, each thread fell hopelessly, weaving together into curls that framed his tanned face. Having emerald eyes framed by tangled golden lashes didn’t seem to brighten his look either. Instead, you could see his lost soul wandering within them.

She was young, with a fair, calm face, whose lines bespoke repression and even a certain strength. But now there was a dull stare in her eyes, whose gaze was fixed away off yonder on one of those patches of blue sky. It was not a glance of reflection, but rather indicated a suspension of intelligent thought.

It’s December 17, 2002 ,5:46pm in Alberta, Canada there’s a bitter burning smell in the air as I return home to my mother. The long drive gives me time to think about the argument we had this morning and I’m full of regret of all the hurtful things we said. All because I didn’t want to discuss my father’s passing 4 years ago.

As he stared down the dark, winding streets of London it was evident that he was in pain beyond imagination. His eyes were evidently engorged and it could be seen through the purple clouds around his eyes that he was close to losing all control of his senses. Blood was seeping from the deep hole in the upper right corner of his left shoulder, every sluggish step he took forward sent a searing pain through his nerves all the way to the wound, leaving no chance for the blood loss to halt. The cold rain was falling gently onto the gloomy road surrounding him but it bothered him not, the dangerously dark setting in fact paid tribute to his murky charisma. His head hung, long grimy hair falling over his eyes as he looked straight down at the aged

Haley had just landed in Chicago O’hare airport, it had been at least 4 hours since she left Sioux falls, SD. “ Right now it’s 8 am and I have my next flight at 10.” she told the man she was standing next to that was getting on the same flight as, but she didn’t realize that. She couldn’t believe it was finally coming true, at 19 Haley was going to go live away from everybody and go to college to get her beginning classes to become a nurse in New York City, New York. Little did she know her plans were going to change very quickly and she would be in a critical condition.

There my father laid, still and pale as if all the life that once consumed him had vanished. His full head of thick, shiny, salt and pepper colored hair was steadily thinning, soon leaving behind nothing but a cold, bare, pasty scalp. The plump and roundness of his stomach had disappeared, leaving it to look as if it never existed to begin with.