GHOST OF A CHANCE is THE CAT'S MEOW.

http://www.amazon.com/Ghost-of-a-Chance/dp/B00LV7YBOM/

 

 

Despite being a supernatural thriller, there are some light-hearted fanciful moments to it. 

 

And Mark Kamish pulls them off famously (pun intended)



{"Now, that's entertainment!"
- Vlad the Impaler.}

{Samuel Clemens, ghost here.

Roland took refuge in the fictional world his Lakota blood made real, giving his cat, Gypsy, to Marlene Dietrich for safekeeping.

I could have told the boy:

never trust a beautiful blonde.

She dumped the poor critter with the mysterious Elu in his Mirror World.

This is Gypsy's story in the critter's own words.} :


That blonde alley cat hadn't fooled me. She hadn't dumped me here in Mirror World for my safety.

She wanted Food Guy all to herself. I was going to find him ... and her. Then, I'd set that two-legged cat straight.

But first I had a situation to take care of.

Slit eyes the size of windows glared at me. I glared back. After all, I was Gypsy, warrior princess, granddaughter of Bast herself.

So what if the Sphinx of Thebes outweighed me by a ton or two? I had her on agility. And good looks.

If she didn't let go of that human ... what was his name? Oh, yes, Elu.

If that Sphinx didn't let go of Elu, I was going to get all Sith on her ample rump.

He glared at me, too. What was his problem?

"It's all your fault, you furry rat," he snapped at me.

"What? My fault? So I unflipped the carrier latch. Big furry deal. I haven't been to the outskirts of Hell in ages.

So I took my chance. It's not my fault you let Fang-Face sneak up on you?"

I wrinkled my muzzle. "Some fearsome Apache you are. Just how do let two tons of Ugly sneak up on you anyway?"

The Sphinx narrowed her eyes and rumbled, "Did you just call me Ugly?"

"Yeah, Mammary Girl, I did."

I was making fun of her so she didn't catch on to the fact that she scared the ever-loving piss out of me.

I looked up at the towering bulk of her. I smiled wide, freezing it into place from sheer terror.

She was a sphinx. An honest to Egypt sphinx. The simple sentence doesn't do her justice.

The leathery rustle of her wings. The hellsky striking fire from her fangs.

Me sceaming like a little kitten at the sight of her. That would do her justice. Not that I screamed mind you.

I have my reputation to think of.

I tried to think of a worse fix I had been in and couldn't. A living, breathing, fang-bearing, claw-extending sphinx was towering over me.

Her huge body, though the size of an elephant, looked like a lion's. Except for the giant eagle wings.

She held a struggling Elu in one clenched paw. She sneered down at him with the head of a woman the size of a small boulder. But her teeth weren't those of a woman's.

They were like a lion's, long and sharp as the comfort of politicians. I watched gloomily as the muscles rippled under her golden fur like knotted ropes under a living canvas.

Her claws oozed out longer and dug into the black sands as if in anticipation of ripping away my flesh.

"You dare call me Mammary Girl?," the Sphinx husked.

I forced a yawn. "You see any other mammaries dragging the sand?"

"My breasts are not! They are round and firm!"

"What century are we talking about, toots?"
With a roar of rage, she lunged at me. She was as agile as a boulder and about as bright. I raced forward and ducked under her stomach.

There. Right under her belly button.

I wasn't thinking damage. I was thinking tickle. Which I did. She curled up laughing in an uncontrollable fit of giggles.

Ever hear a ten ton Sphinx giggle?

Nightmare time believe me.

Elu was still clutched in her now tightening fist. Well, so much for that plan. His dried apricot face was turning all kinds of neat shades of blue.

"What was your strategy in that?," he gasped.

I faked surprise. "Strategy - smatagedy. I'm just having fun."

"I'll show you fun, rat," roared the Sphinx, spinning around to lunge at me.

Two could play that game. Angelina Jolie was doddering compared to my moves.

I scrambled up the sloping face of the boulder to my right, sparks flying from my claws. I leapt onto the broad back of the screaming Sphinx.

"Ride 'em, CowCat," I yowled.

She bucked me off before I could take another breath. I flipped in the air and landed all Jedi-like on the sands in front of her.

"That was fun! Want to do it again?"

Her slit eyes narrowed. "Who do you think you are to talk to me like that?"

"The granddaughter of Bast actually, Sag-Breasts."
The Sphinx roared to the hellsky of the mirror world, then husked, "I laugh at Ba---"

Lightning sliced the insane sky and rasping thunder actually shook the sands beneath my paws.

"Ah, Sand-Ho, I'd cool it on any badmouthing ancient Egyptian forces of nature, were I you."

The Sphinx looked uneasily at the darkening skies, then turned back to me. "If you would have this human unharmed, you must first answer my riddle."

"Hey, not so fast there, Two Ton. You have to earn the right to ask the granddaughter of Bast a riddle by answering one yourself."

Thunder rolled like an angry chorus of bulls above us, and the Sphinx sighed, "And if I fail to answer your riddle?"

I shrugged lazily. "Then, you hand me the human unharmed and leap off the cliff."

The Sphinx roared so that my ears rang, and I made a face. "Too much, huh?"

"All right, then you just leap off the cliff."

"What?," shouted both Elu and the Sphinx.

"Just joking," I snickered.

The Sphinx growled, "Fool of a cat, there isn't even a cliff."

I nodded to the new fixture of landscape. "There wasn't until you cracked smart about Grandmother. She takes things like that personal."

(Which is what I'd been hoping.)
I nodded to Elu. "You can't answer, you just give me the human unharmed. Deal?"

She looked like she wanted to eat the lips off my beautiful, furry face but instead grumbled, "Agreed. Ask your riddle. And be fast with it. The aroma of your flesh hungers my belly."

And it must have. I heard her stomach rumble.

To stall for time to think of a decent, hell, even an indecent riddle, I clapped my two front paws together, "Oh, goody. A command performance."

"Riddle or die!"

I blew out my cheeks, thought, and thought some more. The Sphinx began to growl and a riddle Grandmother used to ask me at breakfast time came to me, and I purred :

"In marble walls as white as milk,

Lined with a skin of softest silk,

Within a fountain crystal clear,

A golden apple does appear,

No doors are there to this stronghold,

But Man breaks in to steal the gold."


I flashed the Sphinx a smile. "What is it?

"What is what?," she shrilled like a granite wall shearing in two.

"What am I describing in my riddle?"

"You spoke nonsense words!"

"This coming from a riddle-asking fool? Shame on you."

"There is no answer. Your flesh and this human's are mine!"

"An egg, flesh-breath. An egg. Yeah, not so easy on the receiving end of a riddle is it?"

"You cheated! And so you --"

She started to lunge when sand-stinging winds swirled all around her and thunder rumbled loud and long. The Sphinx screamed, her claws cutting ruts in the stone beneath her.

But the winds still bore her along like a scrap of paper. She struggled for all the good it did her. She was forced along by the fury of the winds.

Right over the cliff.

"Elu!"

I heard a chuckle from where the Sphinx had dropped him in her efforts to stop herself being pushed over the cliff's edge.

"So you were worried about me, cat."

"Yeah, well don't let it get out. I have my reputation to uphold."

I padded to the cliff's edge and looked over. Ugggh. I made a face.

"No more lasagna for me."

I looked over to Elu. "Speaking of which ... I wonder how Food Guy is doing?"
********************

NOT QUITE ENOUGH ABOUT ME!

Candilynn Fite has nominated me for the Kreativ Award

http://cfitewrite.blogspot.com/

Here's how the award works:

1. Thank and link back to the person who presented you with the award.
2. Answer the ten questions below.
3. Share ten random facts/thoughts about yourself.
4. Nominate seven worthy blogs for the Kreativ Blogger Award. (I know many hate awards so I will skip this one to be kind.)


What is your favorite song?
Currently, COWS ON THE HILL by Jay Ungar

(A lovely waltz that I have Victor Standish dance with Alice as they are surrounded by deadly Sidhe just waiting for the tune to end to kill them -- It is from the chapter of BEST OF ENEMIES entitled LAST DANCE.)


What is your favorite dessert?
Devil's Food Cake with white icing -- because I'm such an angelic guy. You know: opposites attract! :))


What ticks you off?
People who are cruel to children.


When you're upset, what do you do?
When I am angry I speak very low, very distinctly. When I lose a loved one, I go away by myself to cry.

Which is/was your favorite pet?
They were all favorites of mine.

Gypsy was the most loving, intelligent cat I have ever owned. For the lessons she taught me, go here:
http://rolandyeomans.blogspot.com/2011/04/g-is-for-gypsyonly-happy-wordspromise.html


Which do you prefer, black or white?
Black. Sandra calls me Paladin a nickname I only understand because I watched the DVD's when they came out!


What is your biggest fear?
Hurting someone unintentionally who has had all she or he can take from a terrible day. Everyone is having a harder time than they appear so I try to measure my words with care as I live each day.


What is your attitude mostly?
Thoughtful curiosity about life and people. And a quiet humor at myself and my quirks.


What is perfection?
It is an absolute. Something I can chart the course of my life, dreams, and actions by. Like the North Star, I know I will never reach it -- but I can cross the ocean of my life by aiming for it.


What is your guilty pleasure?
GALAXY QUEST!


Ten random things about me...
1. I sound just wonderful when I sing in the shower. Gypsy did not agree!

2. I am in the Witness Protection Program. Naw. Just checking if you were reading.

3. I was born in Detroit, Michigan.

4. I've been everything but a pirate. No, wait. I worked at H & R Block. Oops.

5. I believe in happy marriages. Like albinos and ghosts, I haven't seen any, mind you. But I believe in them.

6. I drive 4,000 miles a month.

7. I believe Olivia Wilde would be wild about me. With the proper head trauma ... and if she squinted ... a lot.

8. Hibbs, the bear with 2 shadows, was the creation of my half-Lakota Mother.

9. Growing up, I wanted to be Bond, James Bond. Actually the Sean Connery one. Hey, I still want to be Sean Connery. Does that mean I haven't grown up?

10. I stay up way too late reading and writing.

G is for GYPSY_Feline Life Lessons

What is Gyspy doing here?

Gypsy is a recurring character in GHOST WRITERS IN THE SKY and

a heroine in her own flash fiction, GYPSY'S TALE:
http://rolandyeomans.blogspot.com/2010/12/gypsys-tale-you-call-this-safe.html

To me GYPSY means UNCONDITIONAL LOVE ...

and she taught by example :

1.) How to take adversity -

A.) She was three years old when abandoned by those she trusted,

mauled by feral cats,

and tricked into my apartment by the sound of crunchies in a cat food box.

B.) She could have chosen to be untrusting, afraid of every sound, wildly destructive --

acting out her anger at those who betrayed and hurt her.

C.) Instead she was kind, patient, loving,

and the most intelligent cat I have ever known.

Intelligence.

Maybe it comes down to that, being intelligent enough to know not to drag the hurtful past with you

but to only bring the sweeter, purer parts of your nature into your future,

thus making it filled with love, understanding, and warmth.

D.) I shall try to learn from her quiet, loving example -- though I know I will not ever equal it.

2.) Love never demands ...

Not once did she meow for food.

She merely sat by my side, looking up with open, imploring, expectant eyes.

And she was rewarded with the best food I could buy for her.

3.) Love still needs reassurance ...

I had surgery some years back that necessitated me being gone for three days,

though Sandra came to feed Gypsy.

Since that time, Gypsy would leap into my bed at night,

snuggling under the crook of my left arm when I turned on my left side, facing the room.

It was as if she needed the reassurance that I was still there,

then she could relax and fall asleep.

I shall try always to reassure those I love that I am there so that they can relax in the darkness.

4.) Love is inventive, supportive of what the other likes ...

Gypsy invented the game of Ear Plug.

Finding one of my ear plugs dangling from my computer counter,

she commenced to bat it like a punching bag.

And thus was born our eternal game of Ear Plug.

Though she loved more the game of laser tag.

And she loved sitting on the puffy arm of my recliner,

watching the same DVD's over and over again.

Because it was the company that mattered not the movie.

I will remember that in the future, seeking to find enjoyment in those things my friends love because I love my friends.

5.) Love makes a hard day softer if ...

No matter how harsh or hard my day had been, my steps became lighter the closer to the end of the work day (night) came.

I knew that when I entered my apartment ...

Gypsy would be seated on the end of my bed,

facing the front door (efficiencies are just big bedrooms).

{Although with all the bookcases, it could double as a library.

And with all the signed movie posters, it could be mistaken for a movie lobby}

No endless refrain of "You just don't know how lousy my day has been!"

Only a happy purring as she nuzzled the top of her head against my open right palm,

as I recited our mantra, "The force is with you, young Gypsy, but you are not a Jedi yet."

She would stoically endure my kiss on the top of her head to get to the good stuff :

Food! Food Guy was home!

So I learned from her why we are given one mouth but two ears.

To listen more than we talk. And listening always should come first.

6.) Love never hurts those it loves ... Gypsy never scratched me.

Not once. I can't say that of any other cats. Gypsy has spoiled me. I probably will never get another cat.

Gypsy was one of a kind. I would only be disappointed in any other cat.

Even today when I hurt her sensitive, enlarged right kidney, she never turned to scratch.

She yowled from the pain and hissed. But never scratched.

I do not think I can say I have never hurt those I loved.

But Gypsy has given me a loving, courageous example to copy.

7.) Every HELLO holds a GOOD-BYE behind it.

But the last GOOD-BYE promises an eternal HELLO.

Today after Gypsy had been given Twilight Sleep as if to prep for surgery,

she gazed into my eyes with her amber ones

that seemed to know this was our last good-bye.

Gypsy steadily gazed lovingly into my eyes with a calmness that comes from being in the arms of one you love.

Gypsy seemed to silently say,

"Don't cry, Roland. There's a HELLO coming for the two of us that will never end."

And I choose to believe Gypsy's eyes.
***
I always end with music. But there is nothing worthy of Gypsy and all she taught me.

So I will end with the haunting poem Francine gave me today.

The one I will always think of as "Gypsy's Song."

"We have a secret, you and I that no one else shall know,
for who but I could see you lie each night in fire glow?

And who but I could reach my hand before we went to bed
and feel the living warmth of you and touch your silken head?

And only I walk woodland paths and see ahead of me,
your small form racing with the wind so young again, and free."

WHY DO WE GO ON?

"Why do we go on?"

As Gypsy, my ghost cat, lapped from my tumbler of ice tea, I sighed,

"There is no certain promise of success. Often we are mocked by those in our world.

Worse, sometimes we are endured or "forgiven our obsession" by those close to us."

Hemingway looked at me from across the table at Meilori's.

"Backbone," he rumbled.

"What?"

He downed the remainder of his rum. "Backbone, son. In yourself. In your work. That is the key to surviving this 'obsession' of ours."

He set his glass with a thump on the oak table. "Your backbone is between you and your self-respect. I can't help you there."

He lit a cigar. "But with the backbone of your story or novel ...

The spine of your novel is what you follow on your character’s evolution from what he was to what he becomes. And the change must be big. Why would we follow a bump on a bumpkin’s life?

All good books have one thing in common. They are truer than real life. Why? In good books, anything that doesn’t contribute to the hero’s transformation is edited away.

So find your backbone. What big picture are you painting? Any brushstroke that doesn’t add to that picture, remove.

Ask 5 questions to find your backbone.

1) Who is your hero?

You’d be surprised how many bad novels wobble about in that department, not giving the reader a sure idea of who to root for.

2) What is the problem?

It has to be clear. It has to be primal. And it has to appear insurmountable.

3) How does the story begin and end?

There has to be a “before” and “after” feel to them. The end must be a ringing bell within the heart of the reader.

4) What is the spiritual problem of the hero?

The physical problem must symbolize the spiritual struggle within your hero.

5) What is your novel about?

What is your story’s theme. A young boy learns that true magic lies within. A man discovers lies only make problems; they do not solve them. You get the picture.

What are you waiting for? You want me to lead you to the computer and type the story for you? Writers write. Dreamers dream and die with their dreams."
***

THE SIMPLE ART OF MURDERING ... YOUR BOOK

Light drifted as a red fog in front of my eyes. I blinked them with an effort.

Consciousness teased me at the edge of the dark of my mind. I tried to move my hands. They were thick, heavy ... far from me ... not my hands at all it seemed.

"Son, you awake with all the clarity of a hot rock," softly laughed a familiar voice.

Raymond Chandler.

With that realization, I finally opened them. I groaned without words.

Chandler was holding my dented copy of THE PASSAGE that the ghost of Mark Twain had taken to show Ernest Hemingway in the Shadowlands. Gypsy, my ghost cat, thumped off my air mattress and onto his lap.

Chandler shook his head at me and gestured to the vacant apartment I was having to live in until repairs were made to my new apartment.

"At least you don't feel crowded."

In his ghost chair by my air mattress, Chandler made room for Gypsy by tossing the big book to the floor. "Don't worry, Roland. I only came to return this travesty of prose. Not to belabor the obvious."

"Ah, Mr. Hemingway ..."

"You know how prone to depression that old boxer is. He's still wandering the Shadowlands, muttering about million dollar book and movie deals."

"I take it you didn't like THE PASSAGE either."

He sat back in his plush leather ghost chair, scratching behind Gypsy's twitching ears. "What's to like?"

He filled his pipe with tobacco. "It is grim and depressing without any true sense of tragedy. You have to care about the people life mangles for there to be tragedy. And it's clear that Cronin doesn't care for his people so we end up not caring either."

He lit his pipe. "No, he just plays with his characters like a child with toy soldiers. And who cares when a toy soldier dies? A personality doesn't die ... just a pawn."

He bent down, picked up the book, flipped the pages for a bit then read : "He could no longer envision his parents' faces. This had been the first thing to go, leaving him in just a matter of days."

He looked at me, more sad than angry. "I had an uncle in Omaha, a minor and crooked (if I'm any judge of character) politician."

His eyes looked off into the shadows, becoming sadder. "As a very small boy I used to spend a part of the summer with him all the way up to the fall."

His voice softened with the remembrance of long ago seasons. "I remember the oak trees and the high wooden sidewalks beside the dirt roads ... and the heat and the fireflies and a lot of other strange insects and the gathering of wild grapes in the fall to make wine ... and once in a while a dead man floating down the muddy river."

He looked into the burning bowl of his pipe silently for long moments then turned back to me. "I remember all that. And Cronin writes that a man forgets the faces of each parent, dead at different times, after ... a few days? I regard his two sentences as disgraces to English prose ... and to the human heart."

His lips twisted into a bitter smile. "But he is a highly praised author while I am but a forgotten hack."

"As long as I'm alive you won't be forgotten, sir."

"You're not getting any younger, Roland."

"Gee, thanks, sir. You have any other reason to visit besides showering me with rays of sunshine?"

"The McGuffin."

"What?"

"Exactly."

"You've lost me."

He smiled crooked. "Not that hard to do so, son."

"I can see you've been talking to all my ex-girl friends."

I covered a half-yawn. "What is this McGuffin? And please don't say 'exactly.'"

He smiled wide around his pipe. "It was the hitch in Hitchcock."

"He made films. He didn't write books."

"Ah, Roland, each novel is a film. Every author is its director. You get to choose the angle of the reader's view of each scene. You choose the lighting, the stars, the script. Your film can be a work of genius."

He made a sour grimace. "Or it can be THE PASSAGE."

"You're singing to the choir, sir. You haven't said what the McGuffin is."

"It's the tagline to your book, Roland. The thing that grabs the attention of the agent and the reader ... and is just as meaningless as all the false fronts to the buildings on a movie set."

He smiled at my frown. "It's what Cronin was trying to use but failed. A McGuffin is a plot element that snares the viewer, drives the plot along, and essentially is not what the movie or novel is about at all."

"I don't understand."

Chandler chuckled. "Take Hitchcock's NOTORIOUS. A spy drama about Nazi agents and a plot to use the evils of uranium. A woman is sent to spy on her old boy friend, a Nazi. Surprises, suspense, and thrills ensue. But the essence of the movie is about two men trying to prove they love the girl. Who does she believe? And why?"

Chandler stabbed at me with his pipe. "That's where Cronin failed. You have to stay with the girl to care. She has to be center stage most of the time. Cronin spends so much time on backstory for characters who stray off the stage, the reader loses focus and attachement."

He stroked Gypsy absently. "Hell, you have to chew a third of the way through his book before you get to characters who stay awhile. Most readers will throw down the book long before then."

He leaned forward, still gesturing with his pipe. "Take NORTH BY NORTHWEST. Hitchcock himself says it contains his emptiest, most nonexistent McGuffin. Halfway through the film, the hero, cursed with being mistaken for a deadly American agent, finds out only his enemy is an importer and exporter of govenment secrets."

Chandler sat back. "That's all the hero gets for his explanation. But you in the audience don't care ... because by then you care for the hero, for his apparently doomed love for a beautiful, deadly girl."

I nodded. "It's like what my mother told me : "Life is staying with the one you brought. Loyalty."

Chandler nodded back. "Yes, tell your epic story. But tell it through the eyes of someone the audience can stick their hopes, worries, and heart on."

His long face shone with the light of a teacher. "The McGuffin is your tagline, son. But it will be your strong characters placed in jeopardy as they struggle for their heart's desire that will sweep your readers along."

He thumped his pipe on the book in his lap as Gypsy wrinkled her nose at the trailing smoke.

"These days movies and books are just McGuffins ... the idea without structure or characters to care about. Or worse, a tease, like a shill crying out at a carnival, promising one thing and delivering quite another."

Chandler sighed, "PSYCHO. Now, we know what it is about. But first viewers of the film thought it was about a stolen $40,000."

He smiled knowingly. "That robbery was only to get us into the Bates motel and a lovely young girl in jeopardy. In bloodier and sloppier fashion, the same could be said of FROM DUSK TO DAWN."

Chandler looked from me into Gypsy's heavy-lidded eyes. "The author is a magician, son. You distract with your McGuffin to hit your reader out of the blue with a sudden surprise and delight."

He blew out his cheeks. "But if the magician bores the audience to sleep with too much distraction, they are all nodding off when he pulls the rabbit out of the hat."

I smiled big. "You know, sir, you're the one who taught me how to write dialogue. And now this."

"How much are you paying me?," he smiled crookedly.

"Ah, nothing."

"I'm worth twice that." He grinned and disappeared.
************
Do you care about the rider in this trailer?

LAUGHTER IS THE BEST MEDICINE BLOGFEST_GYPSY IN HEAVEN

Lydia Kang and Leigh T. Moore are joining forces to give us all a smile this Monday :
http://lydiakang.blogspot.com/2011/04/laughter-is-best-medicine-blogfest.html

Check it out and add to the laughter. Here's my entry :

Although the spirit of Gypsy still curls up in the corner of my apartment to give me snarly remarks, she has taken to wandering of late:



Gypsy strolls up to The Pearly Gates to Heaven. St Peter is receptionist at

the entrance.

St Peter : "I know you! You were a great friend to Roland, so I want to offer a gift to you of one special thing you have always wanted."

Gypsy: "I'd like my very own tree to snooze under."

St Peter: "That's easy. Granted."

Next a group of mice appears.

St Peter: "Ah, I remember you. You were such good mice on earth. You didn't steal food from anyone's house and never hurt other animals.

Therefore, I want to grant you one special wish you always wanted."

The Chief Mouse replies, "Well, we always watched the children

playing and saw them roller skate, and it was beautiful, and

it looked like so much fun. So can we each have some tiny roller skates, please?"

St Peter: "Granted. You shall have your wish."

Next day, St Peter is making the rounds inside the Gates, and sees

Gypsy just back from having given me a hard time.

"Well, Gypsy, are you enjoying your very own tree?"

Gypsy: "Oh, indeed I am. And say...that "Meals on Wheels" thing was a nice touch, too!"

G is for GYPSY_ONLY HAPPY WORDS_PROMISE

To me GYPSY means UNCONDITIONAL LOVE ...

and she taught by example :

1.) How to take adversity -

A.) She was three years old when abandoned by those she trusted,

mauled by feral cats,

and tricked into my apartment by the sound of crunchies in a cat food box.

B.) She could have chosen to be untrusting, afraid of every sound, wildly destructive --

acting out her anger at those who betrayed and hurt her.

C.) Instead she was kind, patient, loving,

and the most intelligent cat I have ever known.

Intelligence.

Maybe it comes down to that, being intelligent enough to know not to drag the hurtful past with you

but to only bring the sweeter, purer parts of your nature into your future,

thus making it filled with love, understanding, and warmth.

D.) I shall try to learn from her quiet, loving example -- though I know I will not ever equal it.

2.) Love never demands ...

Not once did she meow for food.

She merely sat by my side, looking up with open, imploring, expectant eyes.

And she was rewarded with the best food I could buy for her.

3.) Love still needs reassurance ...

I had surgery some years back that necessitated me being gone for three days,

though Sandra came to feed Gypsy.

Since that time, Gypsy would leap into my bed at night,

snuggling under the crook of my left arm when I turned on my left side, facing the room.

It was as if she needed the reassurance that I was still there,

then she could relax and fall asleep.

I shall try always to reassure those I love that I am there so that they can relax in the darkness.

4.) Love is inventive, supportive of what the other likes ...

Gypsy invented the game of Ear Plug.

Finding one of my ear plugs dangling from my computer counter,

she commenced to bat it like a punching bag.

And thus was born our eternal game of Ear Plug.

Though she loved more the game of laser tag.

And she loved sitting on the puffy arm of my recliner,

watching the same DVD's over and over again.

Because it was the company that mattered not the movie.

I will remember that in the future, seeking to find enjoyment in those things my friends love because I love my friends.

5.) Love makes a hard day softer if ...

No matter how harsh or hard my day had been, my steps became lighter the closer to the end of the work day (night) came.

I knew that when I entered my apartment ...

Gypsy would be seated on the end of my bed,

facing the front door (efficiencies are just big bedrooms).

{Although with all the bookcases, it could double as a library.

And with all the signed movie posters, it could be mistaken for a movie lobby}

No endless refrain of "You just don't know how lousy my day has been!"

Only a happy purring as she nuzzled the top of her head against my open right palm,

as I recited our mantra, "The force is with you, young Gypsy, but you are not a Jedi yet."

She would stoically endure my kiss on the top of her head to get to the good stuff :

Food! Food Guy was home!

So I learned from her why we are given one mouth but two ears.

To listen more than we talk. And listening always should come first.

6.) Love never hurts those it loves ... Gypsy never scratched me.

Not once. I can't say that of any other cats. Gypsy has spoiled me. I probably will never get another cat.

Gypsy was one of a kind. I would only be disappointed in any other cat.

Even today when I hurt her sensitive, enlarged right kidney, she never turned to scratch.

She yowled from the pain and hissed. But never scratched.

I do not think I can say I have never hurt those I loved.

But Gypsy has given me a loving, courageous example to copy.

7.) Every HELLO holds a GOOD-BYE behind it.

But the last GOOD-BYE promises an eternal HELLO.

Today after Gypsy had been given Twilight Sleep as if to prep for surgery,

she gazed into my eyes with her amber ones

that seemed to know this was our last good-bye.

Gypsy steadily gazed lovingly into my eyes with a calmness that comes from being in the arms of one you love.

Gypsy seemed to silently say,

"Don't cry, Roland. There's a HELLO coming for the two of us that will never end."

And I choose to believe Gypsy's eyes.
***
I always end with music. But there is nothing worthy of Gypsy and all she taught me.

So I will end with the haunting poem Francine gave me today.

The one I will always think of as "Gypsy's Song."

"We have a secret, you and I that no one else shall know,
for who but I could see you lie each night in fire glow?

And who but I could reach my hand before we went to bed
and feel the living warmth of you and touch your silken head?

And only I walk woodland paths and see ahead of me,
your small form racing with the wind so young again, and free."

GYPSY DIED IN MY ARMS THIS MORNING

I won't be around for awhile.

GYPSY_BEWARE WHAT YOU WISH FOR

Food Guy is still waging mortal combat with bronchitis ...

So I, Gypsy, warrior princess, must save the day yet again.

I have to ask you humans ... why do you do this to yourselves?

Fiction has got to be the roughest trade in prose. No textbooks. No reference. No quotes. Just your imaginations.

You have to invent something that is truer than true. Life doesn't have to make internal sense. Fiction does and still come across as life anyway.

Writing is something you can never do as well as it can be done. Always a challenge.

Jospeh Conrad suffered when he wrote. Called writing "un metier du chien" (a dog's trade)! I bristle and hump my back just writing those words. I have you know, Joe, that writing is NOT a dog's trade. And Food Guy only suffers when he does NOT write.

How about you, guys? Don't you itch and ache if you can't write? Let this feline know, all right?

Food Guy and I were just talking about the magic of short words :

I am the granddaughter of Bast, and I know that the most ancient of words are the short ones. Such words tend to be concrete and emotive :

sky, star, earth, cloud, sun, taste, food, drink, sight.

If an ancient word is a "concept" word, its concept is eternal and heart-stirring rather than abstract : life, war, love, death, peace, and friend.

The most ancient of those words have to do with us :skin, bone, blood, head, toe. The things we know best usually have a simple name.

My point?

To stir the blood and heart and mind of your reader : be simple -- use short, to the marrow words.

Short words don't war with one another in a paragraph like longer ones do. They mesh like a well-worn fighting unit.

In the beginning was the Word. And the end will mumur with one word as well.

Shakespeare could bruise your eye and mind with his arcane and showy phrases. But when he wanted to hit your heart, he used short words :

"My heart is turned to stone. I strike it, and it hurts my hand."

"As flies to cruel boys, are we to the gods. They kill us for sport."

In another incarnation, I sat beside Chief Joseph and wept as he said,

"No one knows where my People are. No food, no blankets, perhaps freezing to death. I want to have time to look for my children. Maybe I can find them among the dead. My heart is sick and sad. From where the sun now stands, I will fight no more forever."

If you would touch the heart, be simple, be short.
***

GYSPY_ALL RIGHT HUMANS, HERE'S HOW YOU WRITE A BESTSELLER

Food Guy's laid out in Bronchitis-Land, so it's up to me to pull up the slack.

Again.

1.) You have to look at your words as if seeing them for the first time.

What's on the page is all your readers are going to see : not what you meant to say, not the images that were in your mind while you wrote them ... just your words.

What emotions do your WRITTEN words leave you with? Yes, I ended that sentence that way on purpose. See how I did that? Don't do it.

2.) If you humans want to succeed, you must have talent like Coleridge had.

More important, you must have the discipline of Michaelangelo. Coleridge wasted his talent in drugs. Leonardo wasted his in doing party favors for princes. I tried to tell them both, but no human listens to the wisdom of knowing eyes.

3.) Leave out the boring stuff.

You know what I mean. Pick up a book in the store at random. Slip into the middle and start to read. What do you see?

Big chunky, eye-boring paragraphs. Plaster paris descriptions of places I have no wish to be. Slides of cousin Merle's trip to Idaho. (You've seen one pair of potato eyes, you've seen them all.)

Blah-blah-blah.

The dialogue should be short, funny, something to bring up your eyes from the page and make you reflect on something that hit you like the memory of your first mistake in public.

There should be danger, love, or laughter ... on every page. Because it may be the only page the considering buyer will ever read.

4.) Like Hemingway told me : the most important gift for a good writer is a built-in, shockproof, shit detector.

No shit.

While Food Guy was droning the Mormon Tabernacle of snores, I was reading Nathan Bransford first paragraph contest for laughs.

There was this one where a woman lay in this pit of dead bodies, looking up at a ton of rock and more human corpses about to drop on her. Did she swear and get the hell out of the way?

No, she laid there like Hamlet contemplating the state of the world where such a thing could happen.

Uh, excuse me, lady?

I understand depressed. I mean, I do live with Food Guy, and all. But if tons of rock and rotting bodies are about to crush this furry princess, I scramble the hell out of the way ...

and leave the hissing at life's pissiness for when I am safely out of the way, thank you very much!

5.) Your scenes must read true ... fake we can have by listening to the State of the Union address.

You humans read to live outside of yourselves ... in adventures where life makes sense, where you find fun, acceptance, and love. Life is only life ...

when it is real ... or seems real.

When characters are flat, prose puppets, made to do what you want them to do, not what real flesh-and-blood humans would do or say ...

the story seems flat like coke left out on the table a day, no fizz, no sparkle ... no readers.

6.) Last words of wisdom from the princess :

Good writing is true writing. If a human is making up a story, it will be true in proportion to the amount of knowledge of life he has and how disciplined he is. So that when he makes something up, it is as it would truly be.

The more a human learns of life, the better he or she will be able to imagine what a set of circumstances would feel or seem. Do it well enough, and the readers will get a feeling as if what they are reading actually happened.

Last : Write for yourself. And write for a person you know, living or dead, to make that person smile or be caught up in the wonder.

*) My paws are sore. That's all the wisdom you humans can handle. Oh, goody, Food Guy just turned over. The snoring assault has ended.
***

GYPSY STILL HASN'T FORGIVEN ME_GHOST OF ERNEST HEMINGWAY

I'm going to give you the secret. But first ...

I should have expected it. Gypsy still hasn't forgiven me for making life hard for her Food Guy.

Ghost of Ernest Hemingway here.

If you're wondering what I'm talking about, you'll have to read GHOST OF A CHANCE here on this blog.

For now, I'm here to spell Roland. Give him time to mend from that cold of his.

For awhile there, I thought he was going to join us ghosts.

Now, back to the secret ...

The secret to writing a great novel is that it is poetry written into prose.

Period. The end. No more. No less.

Always boiling it down, rather than spreading it thin or thick.

All good books are alike in that they are truer than if they really had happened. And after you've finished them, you feel a bit as if they had happened to you.

How do they do that?

By leaving out all the needless trifles that sound pretty but prove pointless.

Those books will have you tasting the salt in the sea air,

smelling the fragrance of the cooking in the woman's hair as you hold her close,

and feeling the warmth of the sun as you lie bleeding in the sand by the stamping hooves of the bull.

It is the hardest thing to do in prose, putting the poetry into it -- but it is the most important.

If you do the writing well enough, the first person narration will seem real. Why?

Because you wrote as if the experiences were happening to you, housed inside the mind and body of your hero.

Those tiny things like the grit of dirt in your mouth when you were knocked down into it by that thug.

How the inside of your mouth felt like shredded wheat from the first blow to your lips.

How sweet was the sound of his grunt of pain as you butted him in the face, breaking his nose.

If you can do this, your novel will become a part of the reader's reality and a part of his experience. He will add details from his own warehouse of memories, making your novel rich with the depth of his own collective unconscious.

Do this, and your novel will become part of his life. It will live as long as he does. Do it well enough, and it will live as long as his children who hear about the novel, then read it for themselves.

Do it true and well enough, it will last as long as there are human beings.
***
This is NOT one of those stories Hemingway was writing about :

GYPSY RETURNS_SIGNIFICANT OTHER BLOGFEST entry

Gypsy's entry for D L Hammons SIGNIFICANT OTHER BLOGFEST :

http://dlcruisingaltitude.blogspot.com/

Sssh! Food Guy is sleeping.

The big wuss. So he has a itty bitty cold. I thought his fever of 102 degrees made a warm pillow of his forehead for me.

He whined so much about going to work for one little day that I left a wedge of cheese for him on his pillow. And did he appreciate my joke of giving him cheese with his whine?

No, he did not.

Does he appreciate me curling up on his chest for added weight resistance as he huffs through his sit-up's?

No, he does not.

Does he appreciate my feline criticism as I paw at the keys as he types?

Of course not. My words would be magical. His just lay there like stale tuna, as pretty as road-kill and about as tasty.

And all those literary ghosts who insist on ruining our sleep? What's up with that?

Ernest Heminway. Raymond Chandler. Mark Twain, well I like him ... he knows where I like my ears scratched. But if that Frost guy shows up again, droning on about which road to pick, I'll pick one for him all right ... the one that leads to the door!

And so help me if Dr. Seuss dares to show his ghostly face, I'll barf up a furball in his green eggs and ham!

If you out there wonder where Food Guy gets all the great ideas, look no further than this gypsy princess. The lousy ones, of course, are all his.
***
Another mindless movie Food Guy will probably see and ... sigh ... enjoy :

ALL LITERATURE BEGINS WITH GEOGRAPHY

Sleep swept me along in currents of rich, quiet darkness as I drifted along ink seas under starless skies.

A thin, reedy voice spoke to my right. Gypsy yowled her "Not another friggin' ghost" yowl.

"All literature begins with geography."

I pried lead-heavy eyelids reluctantly open. Gypsy shoved her tiny head under my pillow, grumbling low. Robert Frost smiled at her from his ghost chair by my bed.

He gazed off into the darkness and murmured one of the last lines he ever wrote while alive :


"Unless I'm wrong
I but obey
The urge of a song
I'm—bound—away!

And I may return
If dissatisfied
With what I learn
From having died."


He turned his eyes back to me. "As it turned out, I was quite satisfied with what I learned. But Elinor has chased me out of our celestial farm tonight."

He rubbed his chin ruefully. "She says I always get insufferable on this day."

Gypsy pulled her head out from under the pillow and yowled. Robert Frost shook his head and answered my cat.

"Upon this day in 1963 I learned that my "In the Clearing" collection had won the Bollingen Prize for best book of American verse, 1962. It oddly pleased me to no end for some reason."

I tried to blink some clarity to the fog of my awakening mind. "Ah, Mr. Frost ...."

"Rob, please."

"Uh, Rob, do you really think all literature begins with geography?"

He laughed. "Starting with absolute pronouncements is an old teaching trick, Roland. You were a teacher as was I. You know that. It is human nature to rail against them, to kick holes in them, thus thinking through your own beliefs in the meantime."

He pursed his lips like a troubled librarian for a moment. "But geography certainly shaped my own poetry. You could call these places "Frost Country":

San Francisco, Lawrence, Derry, England, Franconia, Shaftsbury, Ripton and Bennington. These are the literary time capsules of my beliefs and will enrich your enjoyment of my poetry."

Gypsy angrily muttered under her feline breath, and Robert Frost chuckled, "No that is not the reason I disturbed your sleep, cat."

He patted his knees. "I wanted to tell you, Roland, to persevere. You, and all your blog friends, have more talent than you believe, and this new year will bring fresh harvests."

He rose slowly, smiling ruefully. "By working faithfully eight hours a day you may eventually get to be boss and work twelve hours a day."

He started to fade like a dream upon awakening. "No great wisdom from beyond I'm afraid. In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life: it goes on."

He tapped my shoulder with all-but-invisible hand. "Forgive me my nonsense, as I also forgive the nonsense of those that think they talk sense."

The last thing I saw was his faint smile. "Now, back home to Elinor. Home is the place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in."

And he was gone.

So? Do you have any tricks you use when you want to make your readers think? And do you think Rob was right? Does all literature begin with geography? Do the important places in your life affect how and what you write?
***

GHOST OF A CHANCE_CHAPTER 44_MARLENE BY STARLIGHT {THE END}

A young man of maybe fourteen strolled up to us.

"Toya, you know perfectly well that Captain Sam sent those clothes to Roland to say 'Thanks' for helping him in Hell."

Her coffee cream face became a living sneer. "Victor ...."

She tossed him the package. "Stick it!"

He flashed a gypsy smile. "Sure thing. Bend over."

Marlene chuckled, "I like you."

Victor winked at her, handing her the package. "This contains an evening gown for you, too, ma'am."

She mussed his hair, smiling gently at his blush. "Marlene, Victor. And if you're a very good boy, I will let you escort me to my quarters here in Meilori's."

Victor laughed, "And if I'm a naughty boy?"

"Why then, I'll let you peek," Marlene laughed back .

Mark Twain gruffed to me. "I better get Gypsy back to your apartment and apologize to your blog friends."

"Apologize?," I frowned.

Mark rubbed the back of his neck. "Well ... I wrote them you'd died."

"What?"

Mark sputtered, "You looked damn dead when I left, son."

Gypsy took a swipe at him through the carrier. He lifted it up and groused, "You keep that up, gal, and I might have to change my mind about how I feel about felines."

Gypsy yowled at him. Mark Twain chuckled, walking into the growing mists of Meilori's.

I watched them grow smaller and smaller in the fog while their bickering and yowling grew louder and friendlier. I smiled. I was seeing the start of a strange friendship.

I turned around. Marlene was walking arm in arm with Victor. I followed, shaking my head as she tried (and succeeded) in getting him to blush more and more.

Which explains how that photograph of Marlene above came to be taken. She was even more stunning than usual, standing by the piano Ellis Marsalis played. His son Wynton blew his trumpet as Frank Sinatra sang, "Stella By Starlight."

Standing in my new clothes, I smiled as I heard Frank substitute 'Marlene' for 'Stella' in the lyrics. Ava Gardner, sitting at a table close by, winked at her old love for his compliment to her friend.

Glowing slightly from his sojurn in the inferno, Sam McCord strolled up to me, "Thank you is too small a word for you going to Hell for me, son."

He looked like he was biting into a squirming snail, "Which makes me having to ask you to leave a hard thing."

Marlene stiffened at his words. She stormed up to us, proving her hearing was even more awesome than her beauty, but not her temper. "You speak 'thanks' and yet order him out?"

Sam held up a gloved hand. "Marlene, it's for his own good. He's become a legend of sorts here in the Shadowlands. The longer he stays, the more chance someone is going to try and add his scalp to their lodge pole."

Marlene's chin rose defiantly. "An hour. He will have an hour with me here. I will accept nothing less."

Sam shook his head wearily. "I know better than to argue with you when you're in this mood."

Marlene's eyes sparkled dangerously in the dim light. "You are wise."

She turned lazily and floated to Frank, whispering in his ear. Then, she bent by Ellis and Wynton, talking low to them. Frank, smiling wide, walked and sat down by his love, Ava. Ellis and Wynton started playing "The Very Thought of You."

She walked back to us and pointed a long forefinger at Sam. "You will guard Roland's back while we ... dance."

She dragged me to the dance floor, and I protested. "Marlene, I haven't danced in a long time."

She playfully nipped at my earlobe. "With me in your arms, Liebling, you will float."

She wasn't being poetic. We did float. She felt light yet firm and amazingly soft in my arms. We danced close for long moments, then Marlene began to sing low in my ear.

"The mere idea of you,
the longing here for you,
You'll never know how slow the moments go
until I'm near to you."

So with Sam pretending not to see, and Ava winking at Frank, . ... Marlene led me off the dance floor, up the stairs, and into her private quarters in Meilori's ...

And it was a very fine hour.

{END}
***

**

GHOST OF A CHANCE_CHAPTER 43_I ALWAYS COLLECT MY DEBTS

Still sprawled on Meilori's carpet with Marlene half-reclining on me,

I leaned on my left shoulder to look at the monster I had only read about.

To say that the years had not been kind would have been an understatement.

He was sitting at a glowing table, pointing a luger at Marlene. Beside him sat Eva Braun. She was still beautiful ...

in a clammy, undead sort of way.

She was almost wearing a low-cut red evening gown of flimsy silk. Its neckline plunged so that her breasts were almost slipping out as she leaned forward on the glowing table at me. But believe it or not, I wasn't looking at her breasts.

Ah, alright, maybe a little. But it were her pale blue eyes that bothered me. They made the Cheshire Cat's look sane. She leaned even more forward so that any second I was sure one of us was going to get embarrassed.

And I was pretty sure it wasn't going to be her.

But it was Hitler that shook me. He pointed the luger at me as I took the fallen dagger in my right hand. I smiled crooked. What with the Eva's breasts, that made three dangerous weapons pointed at me.

Hitler looked more withered corpse than anything human.
But what was terrifying were the vibrating cables running from the metal pump on his back to his twitching neck.

They were clear so that I could see the red, bubbling liquid pumping into his neck. I watched in horrified fascination as his neck muscles spasmed as the red liquid turned green as it went from the right side of his neck to the left.

That explained why he was still alive. The chandelier's lights striking fire from Eva's long sharp canines explained her long existence.

He sneered at me. "It was never about you, Amerikaner."

The luger shifted to point at Marlene's head. "I put a death sentence on your head, traitor. And I always collect my debts."

He smiled wide. "I had to lure you here to Meilori's where you could die the final death."

He croaked that damn laugh of his. "I found that just a few drops of the liquid in my pump paralyzes ghosts. From there, it was just a matter of having Strasser bait you with those Havana cigars, treated with my liquid, to have this Amerikaner fool framed for Hemingway's 'murder.'"

Eva giggled, "His only refuge would be here ... where you could be killed, traitor."

Marlene spat on the carpet. "Dreck!"

Eva husked, "You are the filth, whore. My love offered you the world to make films for Mother Germany. And you pranced naked before the American troops."

Marlene smiled impishly. "Only for the most fortunate of their generals, Hündin."

Hitler growled, "I think I shall gut-shoot you, Dirne."

He nodded to Death, calmly watching all of us. "See, traitor? Death knows she will soon be needed."

As Hitler had been insulting Marlene, I had pulled up the scortched edge of my T-shirt and plowed a long gash along my side. Blood dribbled out. I was just finishing the fourth word when Hitler turned the luger to me.

"You have written your last, swine."

I edged back to let Marlene see what I had written : "Hemingway appears behind Hitler."

And no sooner had she read the words with wide eyes, Hemingway shimmered right behind the zombie.

"Fuck you, Hitler!"

He took hold of the twin cables from the pump, ripping them from Hitler's neck. He squealed in agony, writhing to the floor. As he fell, great gouts of the putrid liquid splashed onto Eva. She managed a gargled start of a scream before withering away into smoldering corpse.

She fell still beside the moaning mummy Hitler was becoming. Death flowed to them both. "I, too, always collect my debts, ghouls."

She swept her long black cloak around them both and was gone as if she and they had never been there.

Marlene scrambled to her feet as I followed her. "P-Papa? You are alive!"

He nodded as he picked up the luger. "Have been for most of this."

Marlene's face screwed up in sheer fury. "What?"

I said, "Marlene, he saved our lives."

Hemingway pointed the luger right at my heart. "Her life. Not yours."

I heard a heavy thump behind me and an angry yowling. A flash of white and scratched hands blurred by me. Mark Twain slammed a cut-up fist hard into Hemingway's bearded jaw. The man reeled backwards to slam into the carpeted floor and lay still.

Mark Twain chuckled like an evil woodchuck. "I've wanted to do that for years."

He started to turn to me, then whipped about to kick Hemingway's unconscious body. "And damnation, there was nothing wrong with the end of HUCK FINN, you blowhard!"

Marlene sputtered in laughter, "Clemens, what happened to your poor hands?"

He grunted, "A man who carries a cat by the tail learns something he can learn in no other way."

I whipped around. Gypsy's cat carrier was behind me. She sat glaring at Mark Twain. A massive shiny padlock secured the carrier door.

I turned to Mark. "You padlocked Gypsy in there?"

He laughed, showing me the scratched backs of his hands. "Ain't that the blessed truth!"

Marlene hugged us both. But she kissed me.

A caustic cough sounded to my right. Toya, the manager of Meilori's, who had tried to kill me twice. She was holding a thick package.

"Did you really think you had gotten away scott-free? McCord wants to see you up front."
***

GHOST OF A CHANCE_CHAPTER 39_WHEN THE STARS DROWN IN DARKNESS

{I am the Turquoise Woman.

Each life ends.

Whether it ends in whimpering

or in courage depends upon the soul facing that end.

It is, in fact, the only true epitaph your kind leaves.

DreamSinger, whom you know as Roland,

has entered the realm some call Hell to rescue Samuel McCord, whom he breathed into life with his words.

Now, riding Epona, the last unicorn, with Death behind him and Lakota Spirit Warriors beside him,

DreamSinger faces what seems to be the end. Let the words from his strange journal take it from here ....}



A distant roar sounded from all around us. Oh, crap.

Bristling along the horizon encircling us, hundreds of lost souls, creatures, and demons charged to replace their slain brothers.

I twisted around towards Death to see if she would scream again.

She sadly shook her head. "We near my Avatar and Samuel. I dare not scream again."

My heart went sick and cold as a familiar voice, DayStar's, laughed to my far right. "Do you know what the third white meat is? Cat!"

I saw only his hands appear out of thin air. They held Gypsy, my cat, her eyes wild with fear.

DayStar's hands hurled her directly in the path of the charging monstrosities of Hell.

She yowled, and I could have sworn it sounded like my name.

I tugged on Epona's mane to head for Gyspy. Death placed a bitter cold hand on my shoulder.

"We cannot turn. My Avatar and Samuel are close."

"Fine!," I snapped. "Have a great trip."

With a grunt of pain, I flipped my leg over Epona's head, scratching it on her razored tusk. I slipped off and hit the ground in a run towards Gypsy.

Sitting Bull yelled after me. "She is just a cat."

"Wrong! She's MY cat."

A minotaur lunged for me. I slashed across his eyes with Marlene's saber that healed. The manbull bleated shrilly.

"I - I was blind. Now, I see."

It shot up startled into the flaming hellsky. Suddenly Death was beside me. She was floating.

"If you insist," she husked and snatched Marlene's saber from my hand.

"Marlene will soon need this."

And Death was gone. Just like that. And I was weaponless ... except for harsh language.

A heavy weight hit me in the back as claws gouged into me. I huffed. Another creature slashed me across the chest. I reeled sideways and shouted in pain.

I grabbed its arm, pulled back on its wrist, slamming the flat of my palm against its elbow as hard as I could. A sword dropped to the ground.

I bent and snatched it up. I looked for Gypsy.

I spotted her. She was moving so fast it was hard to follow.

Sparks flew from her claws as she bounded across the broad chest of a stone golum. She leapt to the werewolf in front of her, ruining its eyes with those same claws.

Never in one spot long, she sped between legs, up furry chests, across massive backs. She yowled in defiance, heading straight for me.

Something big and furry lunged at me. I slashed. It grunted but kept on coming. A razored tusk sprouted from its chest.

Epona reared beside me. "I leave no friend behind."

Gypsy screamed in pain.

I looked to the sound. She was bleeding, holding up her left front leg.

Suddenly, a blur of lightning appeared next to her. Crazy Horse, human-size now, blocked a talon with his hatchet and drove his knife into a scaled chest.

He looked at me with a crooked grin and spoke in Lakota, "If I die for a cat, I will never forgive you."

I realized the other six Sioux Spirit warriors were fighting all around me. Human-size and without lightning bolts, they were having trouble standing their ground.

Gall scowled to my left. "You would die for a cat?"

I bent next to Gypsy, who nuzzled her head against my palm, and said, "I would die for family."

He nodded. "That I understand."

Gypsy growled low, glaring up at the hellsky. I followed her line of sight. Oh, crap.

A sphinx. An honest-to-Cleopatra Sphinx.

Gypsy rose, holding up her injured leg and baring her teeth.

The Sphinx rumbled, "Later, granddaughter of Bast. Your death is mine. I will slay all who would take that from me."

Epona reared, thumped a charging troll in the throat with her two front hooves, and whinnied, "Whatever. Fight now. Threaten later."

In answer, the Sphinx chomped off the troll's head and spat it back out. "Tasted worse than it looked."

I made a face. It had looked pretty bad.

A giant bull-man, wearing human skulls for shoulder decorations, tried to cleave Red Butte in two with a war-ax, only to have it wrested from his grip by the warrior.

Red Butte twirled it and brought it down in a huge blow which split the BullMan's head in two.

Muttering low and harsh, the five Lakota who remained unarmed quickly picked up fallen weapons,

from swords to hatchets to axes as Crazy Horse kneeled next to Gypsy and whispered, "They feed on you only after I am slain."

Slashing at his attackers with hatchet and knife, Sitting Bull yelled at us.
"Form a circle!"

Epona looked a question at me, and I answered it, "The Power of the World always works in circles. All life tries to be round. The sky is round."

I looked up to the fires sweeping across the skies. "Even the seasons form a great circle in their changing -- and always come back again to where they were.

The life of all Two-Leggeds is a circle from childhood to childhood."

I glared at the nearing Darklings, hate raw in their screaming throats. "And so it is in everything where Power moves."

Epona and Sitting Bull yelled as one. "Form a circle!"

And then the Darklings were upon us.

Borrowed shields and short swords, Epona's pounding hooves, Sphinx claws, Lakota ax and hatchets, my own flashing sword --

all were blurs as they met a wave of slashing claws, tearing fangs, and hissing weapons. The sounds of metal grating upon metal, screams, grunts, and curses were all about our small band.

I saw nothing clear, only a flurry of dark bodies leaping at me.

I heard the wet thud of blades sinking into flesh, the whimper of wounded Darklings sinking to the ground.

Clear up my arm, I felt the numbing impact of sword-blocked swords and lunging talons.

Out of the corner of an eye, I saw Burnt Thigh go down with a bloody wound to the side yet stagger back up to his unsteady feet.

But despite the pounding of steel upon steel, the rending of flesh by fang, I and my new friends stood our ground, stood it, and smiled grimly to one another.

And to this day, still do the Lakota sing of this battle over their campfires,

though the dark weighs heavy upon their spirits and the whispers of doubt and fear mock them.

It is a song of courage against despair, of light raging against the coming of night.

And when wounded Time draws her final, faltering breath,

when the moon herself has become blood, and the gasping stars slowly strangle on the darkness,

even then will the Lakota stop in the midst of their Death Song, stand tall, and look to one another and remember --

-- remember when one small, defiant band of noble spirits fought, not for glory, not for land, nor for power -- but for one small life and the bond that one brave heart feels for another.
***
Read the passage that begins "And to this day ..." with the first minute of the following music. I wrote those words to this very tune :

GYPSY'S TALE : YOU CALL THIS SAFE?

{"Now, that's entertainment!"
- Vlad the Impaler.}

{Samuel Clemens, ghost here.

Roland took refuge in the fictional world his Lakota blood made real, giving his cat, Gypsy, to Marlene for safekeeping.

I could have told the boy : never trust a beautiful blonde. She dumped the poor critter with the mysterious Elu in the Mirror World.

This is Gypsy's story in the critter's own words.} :


That blonde alley cat hadn't fooled me. She hadn't dumped me here in Mirror World for my safety. She wanted Food Guy all to herself. I was going to find him ... and her. Then, I'd set that two-legged cat straight.

But first I had a situation to take care of.

Slit eyes the size of windows glared at me. I glared back. After all, I was Gypsy, warrior princess, granddaughter of Bast herself. So what if the Sphinx of Thebes outweighed me by a ton or two? I had her on agility. And good looks.

If she didn't let go of that human ... what was his name? Oh, yes, Elu. If that Sphinx didn't let go of Elu, I was going to get all Sith on her ample rump.

He glared at me, too. What was his problem?

"It's all your fault, you furry rat," he snapped at me.

"What? My fault? So I unflipped the carrier latch. Big furry deal. I haven't been to the outskirts of Hell in ages. So I took my chance. It's not my fault you let Fang-Face sneak up on you?"

I wrinkled my muzzle. "Some fearsome Apache you are. Just how do let two tons of Ugly sneak up on you anyway?"

The Sphinx narrowed her eyes and rumbled, "Did you just call me Ugly?"

"Yeah, Mammary Girl, I did."

I was making fun of her so she didn't catch on to the fact that she scared the ever-loving piss out of me. I looked up at the towering bulk of her. I smiled wide, freezing it into place from sheer terror.

She was a sphinx. An honest to Egypt sphinx. The simple sentence doesn't do her justice.

The leathery rustle of her wings. The hellsky striking fire from her fangs. Me sceaming like a little kitten at the sight of her. That would do her justice. Not that I screamed mind you.

I have my reputation to think of.

I tried to think of a worse fix I had been in and couldn't. A living, breathing, fang-bearing, claw-extending sphinx was towering over me.

Her huge body, though the size of an elephant, looked like a lion's. Except for the giant eagle wings. She held a struggling Elu in one clenched paw. She sneered down at him with the head of a woman the size of a small boulder. But her teeth weren't those of a woman's.

They were like a lion's, long and sharp as the comfort of politicians. I watched gloomily as the muscles rippled under her golden fur like knotted ropes under a living canvas. Her claws oozed out longer and dug into the black sands as if in anticipation of ripping away my flesh.

"You dare call me Mammary Girl?," the Sphinx husked.

I forced a yawn. "You see any other mammaries dragging the sand?"

"My breasts are not! They are round and firm!"

"What century are we talking about, toots?"

With a roar of rage, she lunged at me. She was as agile as a boulder and about as bright. I raced forward and ducked under her stomach. There. Right under her belly button.

I wasn't thinking damage. I was thinking tickle. Which I did. She curled up laughing in an uncontrollable fit of giggles.

Ever hear a ten ton Sphinx giggle? Nightmare time believe me. Elu was still clutched in her now tightening fist. Well, so much for that plan. His dried apricot face was turning all kinds of neat shades of blue.

"What was your stragedy in that?," he gasped.

I faked surprise. "Stragedy - smatagedy. I'm just having fun."

"I'll show you fun, rat," roared the Sphinx, spinning around to lunge at me.

Two could play that game. Angelina Jolie was doddering compared to my moves. I scrambled up the sloping face of the boulder to my right, sparks flying from my claws. I leapt onto the broad back of the screaming Sphinx.

"Ride 'em, CowCat," I yowled.

She bucked me off before I could take another breath. I flipped in the air and landed all Jedi-like on the sands in front of her.

"That was fun! Want to do it again?"

Her slit eyes narrowed. "Who do you think you are to talk to me like that?"

"The granddaughter of Bast actually, Sag-Breasts."

The Sphinx roared to the hellsky of the mirror world, then husked, "I laugh at Ba---"

Lightning sliced the insane sky and rasping thunder actually shook the sands beneath my paws.

"Ah, Sand-Ho, I'd cool it on any badmouthing ancient Egyptian forces of nature, were I you."

The Sphinx looked uneasily at the darkening skies, then turned back to me. "If you would have this human unharmed, you must first answer my riddle."

"Hey, not so fast there, Two Ton. You have to earn the right to ask the granddaughter of Bast a riddle by answering one yourself."

Thunder rolled like an angry chorus of bulls above us, and the Sphinx sighed, "And if I fail to answer your riddle?"

I shrugged lazily. "Then, you hand me the human unharmed and leap off the cliff."

The Sphinx roared so that my ears rang, and I made a face. "Too much, huh?"

"All right, then you just leap off the cliff."

"What?," shouted both Elu and the Sphinx.

"Just joking," I snickered.

The Sphinx growled, "Fool of a cat, there isn't even a cliff."

I nodded to the new fixture of landscape. "There wasn't until you cracked smart about Grandmother. She takes things like that personal." (Which is what I'd been hoping.)

I nodded to Elu. "You can't answer, you just give me the human unharmed. Deal?"

She looked like she wanted to eat the lips off my beautiful, furry face but instead grumbled, "Agreed. Ask your riddle. And be fast with it. The aroma of your flesh hungers my belly."

And it must have. I heard her stomach rumble.

To stall for time to think of a decent, hell, even an indecent riddle, I clapped my two front paws together, "Oh, goody. A command performance."

"Riddle or die!"

I blew out my cheeks, thought, and thought some more. The Sphinx began to growl and a riddle Grandmother used to ask me at breakfast time came to me, and I purred :

"In marble walls as white as milk,

Lined with a skin of softest silk,

Within a fountain crystal clear,

A golden apple does appear,

No doors are there to this stronghold,

But Man breaks in to steal the gold."


I flashed the Sphinx a smile. "What is it?

"What is what?," she shrilled like a granite wall shearing in two.

"What am I describing in my riddle?"

"You spoke nonsense words!"

"This coming from a riddle-asking fool? Shame on you."

"There is no answer. Your flesh and this human's are mine!"

"An egg, flesh-breath. An egg. Yeah, not so easy on the receiving end of a riddle is it?"

"You cheated! And so you --"

She started to lunge when sand-stinging winds swirled all around her and thunder rumbled loud and long. The Sphinx screamed, her claws cutting ruts in the stone beneath her. But the winds still bore her along like a scrap of paper. She struggled for all the good it did her. She was forced along by the fury of the winds.

Right over the cliff.

"Elu!"

I heard a chuckle from where the Sphinx had dropped him in her efforts to stop herself being pushed over the cliff's edge.

"So you were worried about me, cat."

"Yeah, well don't let it get out. I have my reputation to uphold."

I padded to the cliff's edge and looked over. Ugggh. I made a face.

"No more lasagna for me."

I looked over to Elu. "Speaking of which ... I wonder how Food Guy is doing?"
********************

LIVING IN THE CROSSHAIRS_GHOST OF A CHANCE'S START

"To all of life there is a shadow. The shadow of sadness, doubt, despair. Still it is but an echo of a heart moving forward."
-Roland Yeomans

{Ghost of Samuel Clemens here. Before I can present the end of the tale,

I thought it best to give you its start in Roland's own words from mid-July.}:


Something was tickling my ear. "Schatz! Schatz!"

Someone shook my shoulder. "Oh, Liebling, wake up. Wake up! You are in danger."

Fire.

My apartment was on fire. Ever since I had awakened long years ago to see flames rolling across my ceiling, I had lived in dread of it happening again.

My eyes flew open. I sat up straight in bed. Darkness. No flames. Only a naked blonde in the bed beside me.

Naked blonde?

It was Marlene Dietrich. And she wasn't exactly naked, but heavily clothed she wasn't. She was in a black silk nightgown seemingly made of flimsy spiderwebs.

"Ah, Marlene ..."

"Hush, Liebling. Look down beside your bed."

"Really ...."

"Do it!"

Marlene had never shouted at me before. This was obviously important. I looked down.

"Shit."

Sometimes "Oh, darn" just doesn't cover it. Gypsy was nudging the unmoving body of Ernest Hemingway sprawled beside my bed. His smoldering cigar was just going out.

"Damn, Marlene. I know he's a ghost and all. But ... he looks ... dead."

"He is, Schatz. He is."

I turned to her. "Ghosts can be killed?"

Her finely etched eyebrow rose dangerously, and I said, "All right, dumb question. Obviously ghosts can be killed. But I never knew that."

"Neither did I or any other ghost I have ever met. Which means you are in terrible danger."

"Danger? Why?"

"All through the Shadowlands it is known Papa was jealous of how I felt for you."

"But ..." She placed fingertips I almost felt on my lips.

"He is here. Dead. I am here. In your bed. It will be thought he attacked you, and you killed him out of self-defense."

"Yeah, self-defense. You're right. It will look like self-defense. I mean, I didn't kill him. You know that. But if they think I just defended myself, I'll be in the clear with the other ghosts, right?"

Marlene turned her head so that her waterfall of hair hid her eyes from me. "Wrong, Liebling. All they will care about is that you know how to kill them. And so to protect themselves, they will kill you."

"Ghosts can kill the living?"

Again the eyebrow arched. "O.K. Another dumb question. So all the ghosts are going to come gunning for me?"

"And the others."

My voice rose so that the dogs in the next block must have been awakened. "What others?"

"All the others in the Shadowlands, Liebling. They will want you alive just long enough to tear from you the terrible secret of how to kill ghosts."

"But I don't know how!"

"They will not believe you with the 'proof' of poor Papa's body beside your bed. And it is even worse than you fear."

"Worse? How can it be worse?"

"They are coming now."

"They who?"

Marlene's eyes sank into her pale face. "All of them."
***************************