100 Word Song: "After Midnight"

(Everyone's favorite metallic friend Leeroy, and his less logically inclined compadre Lance, offer us Tom Petty, my second favorite Southerner after Lance himself, and his song "Down South", which I had not previously experienced, for this week's 100 Word Song Challenge.)







It was 20 minutes after politeness, deep into the quiet of a sticky night that made sleep impossible. I somehow knew it was him when I heard the knocking.

"Dude," he said softly.

"Laila threw you out?"

"Yeah," he said. He was carrying a small duffel bag with a tan towel looped through the handles.

"You need to crash?"

"Yeah," he said.

I just walked away from the door, leaving him to shut it.

"If you wake the baby..,"

"You'll kick my ass, I know." He locked my front door. "Thanks, man. I owe you."

"Damn right," I said quietly.

VV 100 WC: "Odyssey"

(Velvet Verbosity's 100 Word Challenge got three fewer rebounds than Chris Bosh last night, and this week's word is "Odyssey".)





Alyssa wasn't ready. He was nice, and he was kind, and he had a way of looking at you that made you forget how to talk. They had been talking about it, and he had been asking, just bringing it up over and over until she finally said okay just to make him stop. It felt like a culmination, the end of a journey, the logical conclusion of everything that had happened, but she still wasn't ready. She thought about saying something, but she didn't, just letting him finish. The metal letters on the back of the van said "Odyssey".