Death of a Blogger:

We’ve lost another

As in gone

Passed on

Never to return? 

Someday me too. 

So shall you

Those over there

And even him. 

Sooner for some

Later for others. 

We will cry for

The ones we know

And some we didn’t

Yet tomorrow

We’ll go on as always

Most we’ll forget

Others maybe not

Until we’re gone

And forgotten forever

I sat staring at the screen.  A thousand words… why do I keep taking on these challenges?  All my family and friends at the coffee shop tell me I’m not a writer.  My wife hates my stories and all she does is yell at me to get a job— a real man’s job.

God, I’d love to have them meet my blogging friends.  They’re always telling me how good I am.  They read what I put my heart and soul into and they tell me the truth.  Hell, I have to stop dwelling on this.  I have a thousand words to get out before October the 16th.

Anna is coming over to help with my spelling.  If not for her and what was his name?  Harven! Hayven! No, Hayden/ Yes, that was his name.  Now, he could write.  Every time he entered one of these writing challenges you could put money on him winning.  We heard he died.  Well, we think that.  He just stop showing up.

I wish Anna would get here.  She is a great spell checker.  She said she had to stop by and get something that would really help around here.  The wife meet her in a blog site and they’ve become great friends.  That is what I like about blogging.  Hell, they even have their own blog site where they type back and forth.  One would think it’s more like a wife support group.  I told Margret blogging would help her get through the hard times.

What dear?  Yes, I’m on the internet looking for a job I’m just taking a break.  Yes, I know I’ve been out of work for a year.  How could I forget?  You remind me fifty times a day.  I’m reading a blog right now it’s Saturday night for God’s sake.  I can’t go for any interviews till Monday anyway.  Tell me when Anna gets here.  I really need her to look over this story.

Margret looks at Anna.  “I don’t know how much more I can take.  We’re going to lose the house and everything.  He spends all his time blogging.  I’m willing to try anything to get him to help out around here or to do something to help pay the bills.”

Anna smiles.  “Margret, this has worked for me, Joanne, Shelly, Dora, and it will work for you, too.  Some husbands just need a little push now and then to get them to where they belong.  Are all those empty beer bottles his?”

“Yes, and that is another thing he seems to be drinking more and more these days.”

“Help me make Ellis a sandwich and hand me another beer.”

“Anna, could you check on Jeff when you go up?  He was a bit restless early tonight.”

“I’d love to.  He is such a darling boy.  We should have a play day for the kids soon.  Mike and Jeff get along so good.  It’s like they have been the best buds all their life.”

Margret smiled.  “I don’t know what I would have done without you and the girls.”

“That’s why we’re here.  Now hand me that sandwich and let me get upstairs to read over his story.”

I was trying to add a few more words when I heard a knock on the door and like to have jumped out of my skin.  I miss the cracking of the floorboards as people walked up and down the hallway.  Why did I let her talk me into putting in that carpet?  “Who is it?”  I asked.

Anna opened the door.  “I brought you a sandwich and a beer.”

I looked up.  “Thanks.”  I need one.  This story is driving me up the wall.  I have more red lines than spell check has words.  That’s not counting the ones spell check didn’t catch.

Anna sat down at the computer.  “Let me have a look and see what I can do.”

About the same time I finished my beer, Anna looked around at me.

“I’m thinking you have had way too many beers,” she said.  “You’ve done better.  You seem to be floating around between thoughts and jumping back and forth on the story line.  Why don’t you go down and get Margret to make me a sandwich and I should have the last two pages read before you get back.”

I went to the top of the staircase and yelled down for Margret to bring me up another sandwich.  Then I was falling forward.  No, I didn’t fall—I felt a hand on my back.  I laid at the foot of the stairs in great pain.  God, I’m still alive, I thought, but I can’t move.

Margret rushed out from the kitchen and stood there looking down at me.

“Call 911,” I whispered.  “I’m hurt bad.”

“Anna! He’s still alive!” Margret screamed.

Anna walked down the stairs, knelt down beside me, running her fingers through the hair on the back of my head then grabbed my beard, quickly twisting my head backward.  The bones in my neck cracked like green limbs in a campfire.

Margret went to the front door and got some old roller-skates Anna left there when she arrived and put one at the top and the other at the bottom of the stairs.  She picked up the phone and started to call 911.  She stopped.  “Wait! Anna, what is your last name?  I’ll need it for the police report when I tell them you were standing next to me in the kitchen when he fell.”

            “I’m Anna Hayden—the late Eddy Hayden’s widow.  I think Ellis might have known him.”