"Celeste"

Dear Readers:

It has been a busy, busy summer and I have not been blogging!  I went to the Michigan Womyn's Music Festival the first two weeks of August, (deep wood camping and no internet), and then returned to get totally engulfed in my work at the New York State Fair's Pan-African Village.  Twelve days of 12-16 hour days of work!  I still have laundry from Michigan and from the State screaming at me from my back hallway!  I just got caught up with paperwork from my job, artwork is crying for completion of an October-November show and characters in my next play are talking up a blue storm in my head demanding that they be written.

Excuses and excuses for not writing my blog.  But today, I wrote Celeste - cause she too has been causing a ruckus in my head!  In fact, the Book Woman Club women are in rebellion and are threatening silence if I don't write!

I hope that you will again read my blog...and have not lost interest!  Please come back!  Don't leave me and the Book Woman Club!  I say this humbily, for it is I who have deserted you, and I am sorry!  Please forgive me!   (Refresh yourself to this story line by reading "Erica" dated July 12th, 2011)  Enjoy!

Celeste Warner paced the hall outside of Erica's hospital room.  A deep frown-line appeared in the center of her forehead. "Oh yes, my dear, you'd be surprised the things I know!" Celeste drew upon memory and intuition.  Memory and hearing.  Memory and taste.  Oh yes, Celeste knew the nature and meaning of Erica's fears!  Erica's fear...and Erica's husband nature!  "What did she say his name was?  Oh yes,....Pedro!"  Celeste rolled Pedro's name around on her tongue, spitting it out, the taste offensive.  "Pedro!"  His name tasted like the odor of the fertilizer that she used in her gardens.  She spat again.  "I know, my dear.  Oh yes, I know!"

Celeste felt burning heat and anger rise in her head.  She stopped pacing and moved towards Erica's hospital room door, the anger forcing her to action; anger demanding her to take charge and fight, protect, love, rescue and, this time, triumph against an evil that had marked her life with loss...forever.  Celeste grabbed the door handle, her grip tightening in super-human strength as an intense pulse of pain flowered in her head.  She felt brain cells erupting, destroying the fragile dams of sanity that fought to hold unchecked-long-buried-deadly-fury.  She felt unfettered-long-armed-hatred battle through gray-matter to ride the boiling surface of scorched and forgotten memory; felt the long-dead - un-forgettable - un-forgivable overflow into a cascading blood-red waterfall that pooled in the pit of her sorrow filled soul.  She felt scorched vomit spew upward, riding upon torrential waves of regret.  Regret upon regret riding regret upon regret.  Regret riding regret upon regret.  Regret riding regret.   And... regret, regret carved a blistering, bitter path through Celeste's mouth.  It slashed upward through the soft flesh of her throat, carved deep canyons through her tongue and brutally knocked out a lifetime of teeth.  Silent screams tumbled from Celeste's lips. Pain-filled.  Primal.  Primitive.  Felt and not heard, those in charge of pain, those sitting at the near-by nurses station looked up, foreheads filled with lines of concern.  They looked up from Styrofoam coffee cups and charts demanding completion.  They looked up with professional concern...and with fear.  They sniffed the air, trying to locate the source of this silent, ragged, cry of pain.

Celeste force-closed her emotion-filled mouth.  "Calm yourself, girl!  Act like a lady and just calm yourself down!" She released the door handle.  The delicate joints of her aged fingers throbbed as they loosed their grip.  Opening her hand, she stretched out each finger, one by one.  The red indentation of the door handle stained the inside of her palm, and Celeste pressed her hand into the soft pillow of her round, matronly stomach.  Unsteady, she backed up, her age-spread-behind finding the solid strength of the wall opposite Erica's hospital room.  Celeste began to rock along the wall as tears flowed down her face, and like her tears, memory and regret fell.  They fell hard, crashing onto the scuffed hospital floor - momentum forcing them upward to the ceiling.  Gravity then wrangled them downward in an ebbing, restless, sorrow-filled tide........that pushed its way under Erica's door.