PROTECTION
By: Elizabeth Holt
One story from a series of short pieces by the budding writer Holt, a member of the Library Coffee House Writing Group, in Long Beach, CA.
Photo Model Abigail Cardenas
The words are barbed, hurled across the room, falling like stones around her. Her eyes sting and she blinks, hard, stamping down her tears with a controlled sort of orcefulness
He's still talking--angrier, now, as she doesn't respond. But what could she say? He was the type to yell just to yell--to mask his meanness under the guise of a "debate. " except he really only ends up attacking her, and she really isn't built for that sort of thing.
So, she nods, agrees, absorbs everything he tells her with a stiff upper lip and burning eyes, and, as she stares at the top of his head, begins wondering how she could use this unpleasant interaction in one of her stories.
Things get a little easier after that.
.