Read Like a Woman for Free Online

metal that it was David being hit. She thought of his crimson red headrest. She thought of the train sounds he made in the Sears’ customer service area. Woooo woooooo wooooo . She thought of the way her fingers fit so perfectly in between his ribs at the city pool as he flapped and splashed around. She thought and thought of something she could go borrow. She looked at the alarm clock by the side of the bed. It was three in the morning. Each metallic blow rocked through her slight frame, pinning her down. She tried to swing her legs over and get up out of bed, but they felt like cement blocks. She could only move her arms; her eyes thrashed wildly in her head. She felt a huge boulder crushing into her chest, letting in only the thinnest stream of air. “ Oooooo. Ooooooo.”
    She lay there for a long time until the pumpkin sounds stopped and the dawn broke. Then she lay there some more. Around ten the next morning she heard the wailing cry of a siren rush up next door. Standing on shaky legs, Taylor looked out her bedroom window. Mr. Doyle’s car was still not there. She saw three medics run into the Doyles’ house and then emerge slowly, wheeling something on a cart. She heard muffled voices. Sliding down out her window, Taylor crouched in the bushes, watching the small gathering of neighbors in front of David’s house.
    â€œWhat happened?” asked one.
    â€œThat crippled kid fell out of his chair and hit his head,” answered another.
    â€œJust a damn shame.”
    Hair wrapped up tight in lime green curlers, Mrs. Jablonski set her coffee cup down on the sidewalk, pulling rosary beads out of the pocket of her orange floral robe. “Yes,” she said. “A shame but also a blessing. God has finally brought deliverance to that poor sick boy trapped inside that simple brain and useless body.”
    Behind them, Taylor saw Mike fly down the street, riding hard, the old black shoebox where he kept the wounded crow strapped tight to the handlebars of his bicycle.

when i was a little girl
    when i was a little girl i had a favorite tree. i’ d run across the city streets to the park where she grew tall, and with determined fingers and stubby little toes, i’ d find familiar holds and climb up to the top. spiraling up her lovely roughened trunk, limbs reaching out for limbs (i knew she reached for me, too), i’ d press my cheek warm into her bark, tuck my sleepy body into her waiting arms, and sometimes i would doze. safe and held by strong pine branches, cradled, rocked by western winds, what could be wrong with a picture such as this?
    what’s wrong with this picture is that it is three o’clock in the morning, the santa ana winds are blowing, and the child is all alone fifty feet in the air. what’s wrong is that it is three o’clock in the l.a. morning, the child is five, six, seven, eight years old and so afraid she does not even feel her fear. besides, she cannot cry, because just below in the soiled city park, the chain boys gather to fight and fuck whatever comes their way .
    what’s wrong with this picture is that this is one of the lucky nights, when the child has won sleep’s slow-motion race and beat the footsteps coming down the hall, tumbling out her bedroom window into the streets below. what’s wrong is that it is three o’clock in the morning, the child is all alone fifty feet in the air, so afraid she does not even know it, and this is one of the lucky nights when she does not have to look down from the corner of the yellowed ceiling and watch what happens to that strangely damp and quiet girl lying in her bed below .

The First Thing You need to Know
    The first thing you need to know as you enter this house is how to get out. The easiest way is to just not come in at all, but sometimes you will have to, especially at dusk or when you hear your first and middle name hollered out from the front porch. Once inside the house, if