K.L. Hallam's Blog, page 5

Climate Strike. We're All in This Together!

"LISTEN TO THE SCIENTISTS!"  ~ Greta Thunberg.


I've been an environmental activist since the days I hoarded glass bottles under the sink in my Williamsburg apartment in 1989-90s, to the chagrin of my roommate who constantly teased me about my "collection" of bottles.

But I couldn't throw them in the garbage! and no one was even talking about recycling in New York City in those days. Well, I was talking ...but there were few answers. So I basically hoarded a huge collection of glass bottles under my sink. Not sure what became of those bottles, it's likely my roommate issued an ultimatum to get rid of them. And then came the plastic bags ... the bane of humanity and the rest of our plastics hanging in our trees in the City. (I also have a certificate as a "green medicine" herbalist. During the Bush years, there was a concern the war-loving administration would take our supplements and access to medicinal plants and herbs. )

This is actually a post, for the Climate Strike! I'd say in SOLIDARITY but we're all in this TOGETHER. We have one BEAUTIFUL paradise of a planet. We're the stewards and we've done terribly.

Sharing a few photos from the 2014 "People's Climate March".  My #ClimatePact   "I swear in all my power to help this planet and its creatures thrive and return this planet to the PARADISE it is!  #ClimatePact   I will STOP abuses when I see them. I will STEP IN. Help find solutions.


 For my #ClimateStrike #ClimatePact I will:

*Ride my bike every day -- even through the snow. (so much fun!)

*Compost!

*Wear repurposed clothing! (eBay!)

* Mend and repair the things I have. (also kind of fun.)

* Plant trees.

* Return to being a vegan.   ~ While I had two vegan births, I'm now a vegetarian but also lactose intolerant. So, I must heed the warnings of my gut.  ;) My body is much smarter than I am.

(I'll return to add more to this list.)

What are a few things you've done that helped our planet, please share so we can do more! 

Here are a few photos from 2014. New York City's People's Climate March, to rev you up for the rally at Foley Square tomorrow 12PM. No matter where you are if you can't attend a rally or march in your town -- start cleaning up! Walk around with signs. Post the photos on Social Media. Share anything you've done that helps clean up our environment and tag #ClimateStrike.






Don't forget the little guys that make a HUGE impact on our planet. 

photo by me! 

When Billie Holiday Addressed Our Health Care System and Opiates.

This country sure is Slooooow to change.  
I'm busy revising my YA historical fantasy, though the story only has one supernatural element. It's set in 1935 at the cusp of the Swing Era and the build-up to WW2.  Believe, me, there've been too many similarities to the persecution of Jewish people, to what the current administration is doing to black and brown people in the U.S.A. TODAY! 
A dear friend and jazz singer gave me Lady Sings the Blues last week for my birthday. Hearing Billie Holiday's voice, her words and her mind has been profound, learning about her life and struggles and jazz music, and then reading this near the end of the book ...



" American used to make fun of the British health system, where sick people could go to doctors and hospitals for free and the government picked up the tab. We laughed about them handing out false teeth and wooden legs for free. We hollered about this being government interference with the practice of medicine.""Well, let me tell you, in America if they haven't got government interference in medicine I don't know what it is. If you're on and you get a doctor for help, he can't help you because the government has passed out regulations saying, in effect, that if he does he will go to jail along with you. If you go to the doctor, he's liable to slam the door in your face and call the cops."
"Most countries in Europe are civilized about it and they have no "narcotics problem" at all. One day America is going to smarten up and do the same thing.  (not as long as the US has systematic racism! Imagine how far we'd be if bigots and cheaters didn't get their way. I'm sure we'd have advanced beyond our current realities. 

"It may not even happen in my lifetime. Whether it does or not is no skin off mine, because I can't possibly be hurt any more than I have been. But for the sake of other people who've got to suffer until the country wakes up, for the sake of young kids whose whle life will be ruined because they are sent to jail instead of a hospital, I pray to God we wake up soon over here. " 


"If you think you need to suffer to play music or sing, you're crazy.  It can fix you so you can't play nothing or sing nothing. The only thing that can happen to you sooner than later you'll get busted, and once that happens you'll never live it down. Just look at me.""I don't want to preach to nobody. I never have and I don't want to begin now. But I do hope some kids will read this book an not miss the point of it. Maybe because I have no kids of my own--not yet--I still think you can help kids by talking straight to them."

"On a recent Sunday, Judge Jonah Goldstein talked about the narcotics problem on TV from New York. He told the people the same thing I've been trying to tell them; that narcotics has to be taken out of the hands of the police and turned over to the doctors! He said that in all his years on the bench he'd never seen anybody but poor people brought in for violation of the dope laws."
"He also said a man had come to him for advice recently because his twenty-year-old son had been hooked on dope. What did the judge advise him to do? Send the boy to England o school where doctors could treat him legally, cure him if they could, and if not, give him treatment legally just as if he had diabetes or something, so he could live a useful normal life."
"That's a hell of a recommendation for a judge to have to make in a civilized country; to admit that the only help a sick person hooked on drugs can get is outside the country,..." 


This is from the 1950s from Billie Holiday's autobiography, Lady Sings the Blues.  
My heart. Her voice lives on! 



In the YA I'm revising the MC is also dealing with barbiturate use. Commonly prescribed for sleeping pills during this time.  

We must make good change happen Faster!   

The Garage from "Ghosts in Tight Spaces" 1K Fiction.

                                    The Garage
“Billy, did you find it?” Mike asked, waiting under the car. Billy, his fifteen-year-old brother, enjoyed getting lost in the tools, lingering over washers and brackets, pieces he might add to a new work of “art”. He wasn’t much help around the garage.But it was summer and he’d promised to keep Billy busy from ten until four o’clock during the week while their parents worked. Billy spent more time studying his surrounding than actually participating in them. “Did you find the torque wrench?”Billy’s green-laced doc martins stayed planted next to Mustang, suspended two feet above him and he stuck his arm out, waiting for the wrench to fall into his hand. “Any time now.”It landed in his hand. “Thank you.”Then Billy walked away. A kid of few words, unless it was a subject he obsessed over, like Wars and Spirits, a video game, which he had to be peeled away or spend his life eating intravenously from his position at the console. He’d talk about Magic cards and things Mike didn’t really understand. Mike was more than a decade older, a surprise baby, just when his parents thought their Golden Years were ahead. He shook his head. At least Billy could bring him the tools he needed while he was under the car. Banging metal sounds as though hubcaps were falling all over the place rattled the garage. He slid out from under the car. Wiped the grease off his hands onto the bandana, then made his way in the direction of the noise. “You OK, buddy?” he called to his little brother. Several hubcaps circled the floor. Billy wasn’t there. Probably scared off thinking he was in trouble. It wasn’t as if he got in terrible trouble, but Billy couldn’t take the tamest scolding and usually retreated when the hint of a confrontation arose. Mike knew how to tread lightly.  “It’s all right, Billy, nothing’s broken! No harm no foul.” He laughed using the same expression his father would. “Where are you?” Mike searched around. Not seeing his brother, he began picking up the hubcaps and stacking them against the wall, then checked his watch. “Looks like lunchtime!” That was sure to get Billy out of his hiding place.“I’m ordering a pizza unless you want to go for a drive?” No answer.  Mike checked the restroom. Billy wasn’t there. “Well, I’m starving,” Mike said and went to the phone against the wall and dialed the number for pizza delivery. Billy ran passed. “Hey, wait. You want pepperoni?” Mike called to him. Billy stopped, turned to Mike and shook his head vehemently then continued on his way with a determined expression. Mike rolled his eyes; it was going to be a long day. 
Once Billy got spooked it could take hours for him to return to pre-spooked Billy. That Mike could handle. Scared Billy was unpredictable. “I’m ordering the usual, “ he said. “You’ll eat it eventually.” Mike organized a few items in the office while waiting for the pizza delivery. Billy came into the room, his eyes skimming the items laid out on the desk. A collection of discarded items from the garage and junk from the dumpster. “Whacha looking for?” Mike asked. “Ah, not sure.” Billy opened the desk drawer. “Just need—here!” He pulled out a coil of copper wire.Mike gave him the eye. He didn’t mind if his brother busied himself with another project. At least, maybe he’d get some work done with Billy entertained.  The pizza had arrived, but Billy wouldn’t respond to his calls. If he wasn’t hungry, he would be, eventually. Mike finished his lunch, drank water from the cooler, and then got back to fixing the Mustang.  Billy’s Doc Martins pass by, again and again, carrying rattling and clamoring things along with him, and now dragged a long metal pipe. What’s he up to? “Are you building a spaceship?” Mike laughed. Billy returned for more items. Such determination would warrant a masterpiece. He had to be sure and let Billy know that. Any time he could boost his brother’s confidence he’d done his job.  Mike finished correcting the alignment of the wheels and scooted out. Cold pizza sat on the desk in the office. He shook his head and went through to the garage to find his brother. “Hey, Van Gogh, you aren’t even eating? Must be some work of art you’ve got out back.” Mike trudged to the exit door and opened it.Materializing before his eyes, a disk of light lifted a few feet above the ground. With the sun’s reflection, it was hard to determine the outline. Below the spinning orb, a mound festooned with assorted metal links, wrenches, hammers, and bolts held together with twisted copper wires pointed into the shape of a pyramid. The orb expanded and retracted. Mike turned to his brother, staring at the disk, eyes wide, trance-like, and the orb zipped away.“What was that?”“They came when I made it,” Billy said. “They said the pyramid’s a phone. “A telephone?”“Yeah, I communicate with their star beings somehow with the pyramid.”“Really?” Billy leaned closer and shouted up into the wires coiled into the shape of a cone, “My brother doesn’t believe me.”The orb returned. Out of nowhere. And waited at the point of the pyramid. More arrived. And more still. Until the clear sky became covered in white pulsating orbs. “Now what?” Mike asked. “I called that one here," Billy said. “They can’t all come unless we build more communication systems, the way they used to visit.” Mike looked away from his brother and watched the disk fade in and out of visibility.
The End

Audio of the Mueller Report!

Our country is under attack!  The POTUS is illegitimate!  
Tax march in March of 2017. 

Here is an audio of The Mueller Report ... 

"Delivering the Mueller Report, in an audiobook-style format, without political commentary." There's a link to donate if you're able to.  


"On April 18, 2019, the Department of Justice released the "Report on the Investigation into Russian Interference in the 2016 Presidential Election." This section covers some background behind the creation of this audio podcast and the "Introduction to Volume 1" from pages 1 to 3 of the report.  Introduction to Volume 1... (link) Or if you prefer reading the report and reviewing the summaries, the link. 
We need to get this mobster-grifter-family of nepotists (white supremacists) out of OUR House! Then work on the air we breathe and the water we drink! And listen to scientists!  We have little time left! And there's nowhere to hide from the roll-backs and destruction the GOP and the House Leader, #MoscowMitch McConnell have unleashed. They've enabled this demagogue in the White House. The narcissist has rolled back ALL of Obama's protections. Things we've fought hard for over the years!! Gear up, my friends. The battle is for the TRUTH! 

A 1K Short Story from my Collection "Ghosts in Tight Spaces."

The Department Store
“Can I just try on this last piece?” Kathy asked the salesgirl. “Sure, but we’re closing in twenty minutes.”“Okay, okay. Wendy, hold my bag I’ll be faster,” Kathy asked her sister, Wendy, who'd folded her arms.  “Make it fast, we have to meet Gary and Paul at Rockland. They’ll be pissed if we’re late again.”“Not to worry, I know how to deal with Gary,” Kathy said, before running into the dressing room. Passing rows of curtained rooms, no one was in the fitting room with her. She stopped at the first room and drew the curtain closed. Shimmied out of her jeans, and tugged the bias-cut silk dress over her head and camisole. Half the price of yesterday. Was it enough to ignore the bulge under her armpit? No. She released herself from the sausage encasing and pulled a brush out of her purse. The lights went out. “What-the ... ?” Kathy ran and made her way to the entrance of the dressing room. The department store was dark throughout. “Hey, is anyone here? Wendy!” she called for her sister. She turned through each of the isles looking to spot someone. Anyone. “Wendy? She must have gone out to the car.” Kathy dropped the dress next t the cash register and hurried to the double glass door facing the interior mall. The doors were locked. She pushed and pushed again on the levers. The doors wouldn’t budge. “Is ANYONE here? Let me OUT!” Kathy screamed. Pulling the phone from her bag, she dialed her sister. “This is ridiculous . . . come on . . . answer.”“Hello?”“Wendy? Where the hell’d you go?” Kathy cried. “I’m locked inside the department store.”“Who is this?”“It’s me--goofball, your sister.”“My sister? . . . my sister died, two years ago.”“You’re funny. Gary put you up to this? He’ll pay, all right.  Can you please, get me out?”“I’m sorry.” Wendy hung up. “What?” Kathy called again, but Wendy wouldn’t answer. She called three, four times, and still, no one answered the phone. Then she dialed Gary’s number shaking her head. “They think this is funny? I thought we were in a hurry to get a good seat for the show.” The number you have reached has been disconnected . . . That’s strange. Kathy searched around the dark unable to process what was happening. She dialed 911. “You’ve reached  911.”“Yes! Hello. Can you hear me?”“Yes, ma’am, what is your emergency?”“Oh my God, yes. Thank goodness. I’m trapped inside Wooltstein’s Department store -- at East Line Mall. Everyone’s gone and I’m trapped inside.”“Where did you say you’re calling from, Ma’am? I’m not getting a computation for your location.”“East Line Mall. In Woolstein’s--at the entrance! Can someone get me out?”Kathy heard whispering. “East Line Mall burned down two years ago.”“What? That’s impossible. I’m inside the mall right now. ““It is a crime punishable up to fifteen years for playing with the emergency call system.”“No—Please don’t go. My name is Kathy Driver. I live at 500 Beacon Road. Please call my sister, Wendy at (500) 225-1515.“Someone is headed to that address to see about your emergency.”“The mall?”“Of course, not.” The operator sounded irritated. “You say you’re inside the mall’s department store that burned to ash two years ago. They’re checking with the folks at 500 Beacon.”What else was there to say? “Yes!” Kathy kept watch over the ghost town scanning the shops she could see. She’d forgotten about the emergency exit. There’d be an alternative exit, somewhere. Keeping the phone line open, using the light of her phone to navigate, she made her way through the racks to the opposite side of the store. The EXIT sign wasn’t lit. She pushed on the metal door. It wouldn’t budge. Spotting a water fountain, grateful to get a cool drink, she bent over, but no water trickled out of the fountain.  How long could she survive without water? Her phone’s battery down to the red, the clock off. Surely, Gary and her sister would come looking for her. It felt as though hours had passed. The concert would be over by now. With her phone dying, no water to drink, sitting in the dark, Kathy found a piece of gum inside her purse and she chewed it, fading away. Baby Baby, Baby, Yeah. It was her cell phone.  “Hello, hello?”“Is this Kathy Driver, who once lived at 500 Beacon Road.”’“I live there now.”“Not according to the Beacon family. They said you perished in that fire at the mall, two years ago on this day. They are very upset.”“That’s impossible if I’m talking to YOU? Isn’t it? Why don’t you just send someone out here? Then you’ll see.”“Ma’am, there are two patrol cars out at the old site of the East Line mall now.”“Great! Where? Where are they?” Kathy ran to the back entrance of the department store and watched the parking lot. Two police officers passed near the door and she banged on the glass. So close, one of the officers glared into her eyes. But did nothing. He picked up the radio dispatch when he returned to the vehicle and they drove away. “They left,” Kathy whispered. “The officer radioed in that there was nothing to see at East Line. No mall, no cars, people, not anyone. Maybe this game has gone too far,” the operator suggested. “Yes, it’s gone too far . . .”  Kathy turned her back on the glass window and slid to the floor. Out of ideas. Her cellphone went black.  


The End.

"This deserves the attention of every American." ~ Mueller.

Robert Mueller Testifies Before House Judiciary CommitteeFormer Special Counsel Robert Mueller testified before the House Judiciary and House Intelligence Committees on the Russia investigation and the published report released by his office.
Mueller Hearings LIVE on C-Span

All work is on hold! 

Beneath the Layers.

Unplug this Fourth of July! Boycott the Fascism.

It’s hard to celebrate being free from tyrannical rule when this POTUS of has tanks rolling up to the White House. What an FU to the American people!  Using 80+ millions of our tax dollars to inflate his dictator-wannabe ego. And taking 2.5 million away from National Park Services!  
Not to mention the reserved section for his republican enablers! Tanks and hail Dear Leader, are reserved for fascists. My grandfather, who flew over the Mississippi during WW2, keeping Nazi subs from entering the river – WANTS me to write this! And to fight back against this regime EVERY DAY. The Russian assisted, illegitimate POTUS is DESTROYING (trying to) what the American people have fought tooth and nail for.
The USA is kidnapping children! We have stolen children from their parents/caretakers and made profits off this!!!!  I've never had more nightmares and been so thoroughly absorbed with disgust and utter SHAME! and ready to FIGHT for those babies!  Those girls, the teen mothers dripping in breastmilk unable to wash! Babies using the same diaper for DAYS! Betsy Devos PROFITING off this! "Migrant Children Given to Adoption Agency "linked" to Devos" 
Aside from this post that’s appeasing my mounting anger, I’ll be offline. I won’t be leaving the city this year, but it’s so quiet in New York City I think I’m going to enjoy this. Until the fireworks later tonight wake me up!  
Stay safe this fourth! Enjoy life & Family. Get outside. Turn off the TV. Unplug! Rest up, because out fight to REMOVE this treasonous agent isn’t over yet.Why it's Called Independence Day.  << If you'd like a reminder. 



Photos from the #ClosetheCamps rally on July 2, 2019, on E. 7th Street at Middle Collegiate Church in NYC.

Hello, Friends! I'll be adding a few more wate...

Hello, Friends!  

I'll be adding a few more watercolors here on my blog for safe keeping. 

I'm not sure how long I'll have my website KLHallam.com. I signed up when I had two books coming out the same year. I can't justify spending the money when it costs more than what I've made on book sales. (For now) I am hopeful. Eternally hopeful ... and it's a setup. lol. 

I wondered if I might keep the website and showcase my illustrations, but any extra time I have I just want to write fiction! Add that to my daily 5-6 hours Mon-Friday at the day job --I'm basically addicted to writing. 

But I'm planning a series of illustrations from old movie stills and legendary film and jazz stars. 




My watercolor illustration of Meryl Streep from around 1979, the year Kramer vs. Kramer came out. Why did I paint her?  Because I admire Meryl on so many levels. 

What They Leave Behind

I'd already published this story on Wattpad and couldn't send out for a sub.  (My long forgotten Watpadd account) 

So I share here, it's a little early, and slightly over the 1K mark. The beginning was taken from a true life event. Of missing time and a head wound from when I was five years old living on an Air Force Base in Caribou, Maine. I remember that day very clearly. 






           What They Leave Behind   Karen L. Hallam




I heard a helicopter. The leaves soaked with sunshine made them translucent, but I couldn’t see anything. A clear summer day, and I was playing with friends near the Air Force base. Helicopters certainly weren’t unusual.  Helicopters and sunlight, those were my only recollection. When I came out from under the trees a friend shouted, “What happened to your head?”Sure enough, I found a wet, warm spot, and had a look. It was blood. Definitely blood. My head didn’t hurt and I had no idea what happened. I know now, the head can bleed profusely, but I was only ten years old. I walked home and my mother approached, fast and frightened, asking what happened.“That’s probably when it started.” I turned to Doctor Murphy. “ . . . the missing time. Isn’t that what they say?”“Who?”“The Abducted. They always mention missing time, and ...” I stopped. I wasn’t sure what they said. I might have heard Dillon say something once. Dillon’s kept my head straight, through all this.“What about the other time, with Sadie?” he asked.“That’s why I’m here.” I settled back. I much preferred the times when I couldn’t remember anything. This wasn’t going to be fun.“Sadie and I were walking, out on 9D. It was dark, as you know. It was last Monday just after the sunset. There were lights floating around, orbs or  balls …” I had to take a breath I couldn’t control the wretched pain in my stomach. The wave machine and my hands were shaking. I rub my sweaty hands on my pants and re-crossed my legs, stiff from sitting too long. I’d hate to lie down, never know if he’d wiped the couch.“Just go slow,” the doctor said. Yes, slow, but the images don’t run in slow motion. “The darkness was unreal and with the new moon, we could see the stars to infinity. We walked toward the river, and at first our legs slowed, and then our arms wouldn’t move. I looked at Sadie. Her face vibrated, every line and crease. The trees started vibrating and hummed, like maybe they were slowing down too. Or matter was breaking up? It’s hard to put into words. Dillon said that happens.” Doctor Murphy’s glasses dropped to his nose. “You and Sadie hadn’t been drinking? Or anything?”What if we’d used drugs? We didn’t, but come on.  It’s a judgment call. He’s calling it. My gaze drifted outside of his home-office window. His daughter played with dolls near the woods. “That’s when we saw it.”  “Is that when they took her?” he asked, his jowl flexed. He must love this part and wanted me to say it again. Why I had to go over it, over and over? I nodded. “They said they were watching, and that Sadie had a contract with them.”“Is that what they said to you?” “It’s not like we talked, but yeah, they did. Said her family made contact years ago. Why don’t you ask them a few questions? Honestly, I think you really should.” I couldn’t breathe again, the room spun, and to ground myself, I watched the little girl through the window. Dust particles floated on the beam of sunlight. I wanted to float away with the dust. “Why do you suppose they didn’t take you?” he asked. “They said they did, many times. My number wasn’t up, I guess? Not that day, anyway.” I laughed, but it wasn’t funny. My nerves were impossible to tamper down. They were always watching. I screamed for them to release her. “That was only a week ago.” “Yes, Kylie and you’re still under investigation for Sadie’s disappearance. I believe you I do. I’ve heard a case or two similar to yours, and yes, there was missing time as well. But to get the police to believe it, and a lawyer, not so easy.”“Unless she comes back,” I said, hopefully.  “Yes, if she comes back.”“They hang around military bases, you know, like the one in Maine, where I used to live as a kid.”Doctor Murphy stood up. “The officers are here.” He put down his clipboard, and briefly checked on his daughter from the window before leaving to greet the officers, waiting in the other room.“Time’s up,” said officer Frank. I was already standing, and he took my arms by force. I didn’t resist. Doctor Murphy winced. I told them everything I saw. How Sophie split in two: one bubble and one transparent body, a duplicate of herself. Her “earthly” body or what every you want to call it, disappeared without a trace. I’m the only trace. Everything leads to me.Doctor Murphy said he believed me, but I don’t buy it. I’m escorted, or more accurately, towed to the police car. Head shoved under and in like a deranged killer. Where’s the body. Just tell us where the body is? I stopped telling them what happened to her body. Years ago, while listening to the radio, the music changed to a song that answered the question on my mind. It got my attention. The lights flickered in response and I knew they were there. “How long have you been doing this?” I whispered. The song, Time After Time by Cindy Lauper played, the station was set to a rock-n-roll only broadcast.“For years?” I asked. “What did you do to me when I was ten years old?”You are here to help the others. This earthy role is not your own. It’s not good to know too much or you won’t want to stay. I felt lighter after that, but it only lasted a couple of years. The cooperative feeling dissolved when my dog was killed. I knew it was them. Blood drained from his little terrier body. Why my dog? Never an explanation only cruelty. They were sloppy enough to leave a sticky residue: bioluminescent fluid they leave behind like slugs. There were traces left behind on the radio dial after our “conversation”. What if the police found bioluminescent residue near the river? Would that create enough doubt? Investigations were done during the day. They never saw it glowing at night? “I need to call my lawyer,” I speak through the wire mesh. “Yes, at the Station.”After being shut inside the holding tank, I waited for my parents and the lawyer. I was innocent, and no one believed what really happened. Why were they making me suffer? The bully-aliens didn’t stick around to take the heat. Gonna let the human go down for it? The bunk was cold and without a blanket to keep warm, I crossed my arms and started to cry. I was lost. Even Dillon couldn’t help me now. A ball of light floated into the room and bounced about before settling at the foot of the bunk. “You’re crying,” it was Sadie’s voice. “Sadie, is that you?” “Yes, Kylie, I can see you.”“Are you all right?”“I’m perfect. But you, I had no idea.” “What? That you could disappear without a trace and it wouldn’t look suspicious?” “You’re going to be fine,” she said. “What are they doing to you?”“I’m fulfilling my agreement. My parents will come, and you too, Kyle, have a family here. They wait for your “timing”. “But I already have a family.”“Here, you have two boys and a daughter. Your daughter plays with mine.”I sat up; the metal surface pressed against my bones. Was I hallucinating? The orb grew and I saw Sadie through its sheen like an otherworldly God, and she smiled. “I have another family?” “Yes, Kylie, and your dog is here.”I rubbed my eyes. I rubbed them so much,  I was sure my eyelashes would fall off. “When do I get to see them?” The request was more of a dare. “Are you ready to leave your parents and this world?” I glanced around the jail cell.  “Come Kylie, fall into the orb. It was a little soon, but we decided we couldn’t continue to let you suffer what you didn’t do. I’ll bring you to them.”The light orb danced and grew larger. Sadie stood there, bright as day, looking much the same, only more beautiful and filled with light. Or bioluminescence?Footsteps marched down the hall. I heard my mother’s voice. I’d miss my family. But how do I know I don’t miss my other family? “Come, Kylie, the conduit is closing.”I stood and leaped into the orb. The cell door opened. My father and the guard entered first. They must have seen something because Momma put her hands over her mouth. The guard reached out. Then their heads fixed on the ceiling. I floated with Sadie inside the orb. I’m not sure they saw me, but then Dad yelled that the light was too bright. Momma began crying and clutching at the air. I wanted to tell her I’d see her again.
             The End