When Life Gives You Lily Pads…

It was Aaron’s first Frogs to Princes convention. He’d found the event in an advertisement in the Pond Courier. Lectures ranged from “Cursed Avoidance” to “Sounding Suave With a Frog in Your Throat.” He needed a laugh. He’d been desolate since his fairy godmother had been unable to reverse the spell that turned him into a frog.

The hall buzzed with the upper crust, royal accented croaks of enchanted frogs. All were princes. He started counting and quickly decided that there were more frogs than eligible princesses. A pragmatist, Aaron decided to find a lady frog and start a family.

Witches: Part Two

She saw him coming, saw him in the future, saw the pain and the pleasure, the sad ending to a tale she might have rewritten if only he hadn’t stirred in her the promise that she could be, for once and only, like other girls. A woman, not a witch.

She carried the child. Raven black hair streaked white, the mark of witches. Intuition stirred through her to foretell truths that no one would believe, the Cassandra gene.

Some don’t believe us. Some call us witches. We know their vision is blurred by greed and power and they are wrong.

Witches: Part One

Living as she did on the far side of the moor, there were rumors. She looked the part. Eastern European heritage, a penchant for layered gowns, mostly black. Clothes that simultaneously hide and suggest: witch. Circe, a witch. Glinda too. Healers and granters of wishes, witches all. A misunderstood bunch.

They said her mother’s streak of white hair, a lightening bolt in the thick darkness of her waist length locks, appeared the night her grandmother died. Grandmother, like mother, like daughter, witches touched at birth, not by death, but by the second sight that grew with breasts, blood, and womanhood.

Love Changes Everything

Jack came in from feeding the geese. “That golden goose, she’s laying plain old eggs.”

His mother looked up from stirring the magic bean stew. “Are you sure?”

Jack produced an egg from his basket.

“Let’s see what’s inside.” She cracked the egg against the iron stove into a bowl. The yolk was pure gold surrounded by opals. “What about the others? Did she lay more?”

Jack nodded and pulled three more eggs from the basket. “Maybe she got with the gander.”

His mother cracked them each in turn and found rubies, emeralds and pearls. “She’s one mixed up goose.”

All That Shimmers Is Not Gold

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/
Category:Nathaniel_Hawthorne

He had the touch. Austin got in on crypto early. In college, he mined instead of studying. Hey, why not; the internet was free. He didn’t graduate.

No matter, he struck it rich and moved to a penthouse in Manhattan where he lived like a king. Austin had it made until he didn’t. A whiz kid, yes; a mensch, not so much.

He only knew crypto, which meant nothing to the women he met in bars. It got old with his drinking buddies; the world moved on to other things. Drowning in data, he’d no hope of getting a date.

Bring a Smile Wherever You Go

A prince and a commoner competed to cadge a smile from a princess. The prize: marriage and half the kingdom. The prince claimed the right to go first. Noob mistake.

“Look at him. Sad excuse for a man.”

Cruel, not funny, the prince was struck dumb by his own vanity.

The commoner called his posse. All kinds, all sizes of butterflies cavorted around the princess, a cloud of color. Her aroused senses softened her lips.

The commoner entreated the winged creatures. “Best beauties, brush against her ears, her nose, titillate her love of wonder.” They did just that. She smiled.

Roads Traveled

Gretel did these interviews reluctantly. She hadn’t been a saint, far from it. She did what she had to after her stepmother kicked her and Hansel out. “We were homeless.” The reporter looked into Gretel’s eyes and seemed to reach into her soul. It was an uncomfortable moment. The reporter’s face softened. “But you… Somehow…”

“There was an older woman. When she died we made a go of the bakery. We built a home to shelter runaways.”

The woman wiped away a tear. “She was my sister. The black sheep in an old Wiccan family. She wasn’t all that kind.”

SweePea

She flounced up to the desk, leaned on it with her elbows out, her fingers leaved together, and in a honeyed voice said, “My bed is unacceptable.”

The clerk handed a new arrival keys and turned to her. “I’m so sorry ma’am.”

“I want a new room, not a sniveling apology.”

“Sorry about that, too. We’re full.”

A gentleman approached, “I overheard and I’d like to offer my room.”

“Mr. Prince,” said the clerk. “How kind.”

SweePea liked what she saw when she looked at Prince. “I’ll try the bed. No point moving otherwise.”

Prince offered his arm. “C’mon honey.”

The Riding Hood Brigade

The cool air stank down the dark steps into the underground. She pushed through a turnstile, onto the platform and hopped the subway at Prospect, intending to walk through Central Park to Fifth Avenue where her grandmother lived. Her mouth watered at the thought of Grandma’s gingerbread.

He winked at her and rubbed his crotch. She pulled her red hoodie up. Her thumbs flew over the keyboard on her phone, cycling through numbers, texting the others from her friend group. He followed her off the train. Her posse was there waiting. Watching. They made certain that there were no surprises.

It Takes a Princess to be a Queen

Poor little thing, feet bare, bedraggled dress, beleaguered, and common. The prince says to me, “I’ve found a wife.”

More like a wet kit.

I could say, “She’s a sly one.” He would never listen. He has too good a heart.

So, I tell my maid, “Find her a gown. Let her sup in the kitchen. And lastly, make up the softest bed with the hardest pebbles inside as a test.” Maid’s done this many times.

The ungrateful girl eats nothing. The satin is not fine enough, the slippers too stiff. By morning, I know she’s a princess most uncommon.

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this: